


spin cycle

by tonguetiedcat



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, College AU, F/M, Fluff, Laundromat AU, aged-up, general cuteness of these two dorks in love, some djwifi thrown in there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-18
Updated: 2016-10-19
Packaged: 2018-07-15 20:44:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 27,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7237849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tonguetiedcat/pseuds/tonguetiedcat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adrien Agreste is on his own. Twenty years old and recently moved out of his childhood home, he has to learn the basics of adulthood: cooking, cleaning, laundry. It's all new to him, but he finds that it isn't so bad when he keeps seeing a certain blue-eyed, pig-tailed woman at the laundromat. He can't believe it to be a coincidence that they always meet. It has to be destiny.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. i. September

Adrien Agreste didn't know how to do laundry.

Son of a wealthy designer, he was used to having maids sort his clothes and take them to the cleaners. There was no use for him to learn if it was simply done for him. He didn't even know if his home had a washing machine. Had he ever come across one during those days his boredom pushed him to wander through his house, exploring all the rooms that were never touched (that's to say, most of them)?

When he moved out of his childhood mansion, he didn’t have the luxury of maids or cleaning ladies. He had to do all the cleaning, cooking, and laundry himself. Cleaning and cooking, he could handle, albeit he almost set his apartment on fire the first time he made chicken stir-fry. Perhaps he was just being too ambitious for an amateur chef. Laundry, on the other hand, was one task he had no clue how to even go about.

Naturally, he sought help from his best friend, Nino.

Naturally, seeking help from his best friend was almost as disastrous as his decision to make chicken stir-fry on his third night alone.

Nino stared at him, eyebrows raised to his forehead. “You don’t know how to do laundry?” He asked. His mind seemed to work things out for him, though, and his expression changed to one saying _I should’ve known_. “Sometimes I forget that you’re a rich boy.”

Adrien’s cheeks burned from that comment. He knew that Nino didn’t mean anything spiteful by saying it, but being rich was something Adrien never forgot. Wealth meant privilege, and he wasn’t blind to that. His wealth set him apart from his friends and gave him certain advantages in a harsh world.

But wealth wasn’t everything, and that was something he had known for a long time.

“I’m not rich anymore,” Adrien said in his defense. And it was true. His father was rich, but in moving out, Adrien made the decision to cut himself from the Agreste fortune. His relationship with his father hadn’t changed, really, but his expenses were no longer paid for. He had to use his savings and money from modelling gigs to pay his bills. He had been searching for a job, but getting hired wasn’t nearly as easy as he expected. It was tempting to wave around the Agreste name, but Adrien wanted independence. He wanted to be more than wealth, more than a name.

“That’s right. You’re just as common as the rest of us, surviving on ramen and frozen meals,” Nino snorted. “Soon enough, you’ll gain that freshman fifteen, and you’ll have to wave goodbye to your model status.”

Adrien laughed, the sound vibrating his chest. “Food is the most difficult thing about freedom. I just want to eat everything, but I know that if I want money, I need to model, so I still have to keep in shape. It sucks.”

At that moment, Nino shoved a macaron into his mouth. The delicate sweet crunched as his teeth bore down. Crumbs flew from his mouth as he spoke through the food, “I can’t imagine. Must be so difficult.”

Adrien gave his best friend a playful shove. “Asshole,” he huffed, though he grinned.

Nino swallowed the confection a few moments later. “It’s not my fault that you still model. And really, one macaron isn’t going to do that much damage to your perfect physique,” he said. The blond glanced down at his body, his fingers probing at his lean, muscular stomach. It wasn’t a perfect physique, per say, but he supposed it wasn’t one to be ashamed of. He did have to work hard to keep it that way. At twenty, his metabolism wasn’t what it used to be. A shoulder bumped pulled him from his thoughts. Nino smiled. “Come on, I’ll teach you how to do laundry. But you can’t just come over here every time you need to wash clothes. My roommate wouldn’t be too happy about the depleting supply of detergent and dryer sheets.”

Adrien’s eyebrows furrowed. “But… where am I supposed to go? My apartment complex doesn’t have a laundry room, and I can’t exactly afford my own washer and dryer.”

Nino chuckled at his friend’s cluelessness. He clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Laundromats, my friend. They exist for a reason.”

“Laundromats?” Adrien asked. The line between his brows disappeared as he raised them instead.

“Yeah, laundromats. You know, those places with dozens of washers and dryers available for public use? In which you gather all the coins you can find so you can sit for a couple hours, watching clothes spin around and around?” Nino said.

“I… I didn’t know those were a thing,” he admitted. A giant laundry room available to the public? Mankind truly thought of everything, hm? He questioned how he had never heard of these laundromats, or how he had never seen them. “Wait, where can I find one?”

“There are a couple by the university, not far from your apartment. I’ll walk you to one after literature class on Thursday, okay?” Nino answered.

Adrien nodded, but some strange feeling sank lower in his stomach. He felt so ignorant and inexperienced. Living on his own, though he was finally able to pursue a life of his own, was turning out to be much harder than he expected. He supposed that he had lived too sheltered of a life when he was young.

It was clear that he still had a lot to learn.

 

***

It was a warm Thursday in September when he first saw her.

It was also his first trip to the laundromat alone.

Nino had been very thorough in his instructions of how to sort his clothes, how to work the machines, what he needed to bring, etc. So, an hour after literature class, he walked to his apartment. There, he grabbed his dirty laundry, some coins, soap and supplies, and his physics book. Then, he set off for the laundromat.

The moment he opened the door, his eyes scanned the room. A woman caught his attention.

She was beautiful.

Adrien was used to being around pretty women. After all, he was a model, and there were many campaigns in which an attractive lady (or, more often, multiple attractive ladies) draped herself on his arm or shoulder. Half the time, said lady was half naked. He was used to beauty, but this was a different kind of beautiful.

The gentle curve of her jaw, the roundness of her cheeks, the slope of her nose, the pink color of her plump lips were all captivating in his eyes. He didn’t mean to stare, but there was so much to be seen. Her raven-colored hair was styled into twin tails that rested on either side of her head. Her eyes were cast down at the clothes she was folding. She was a girl of average height, though Adrien had a feeling that he would tower above her. That day, she wore a pink t-shirt under denim overalls.

Adrien stood in the doorway for a long time, just watching. There were only two other people in the laundromat at the time, and they both seemed to be college age. Their eyes were fixated on textbooks, and they were oblivious to the awestruck Adrien. The girl was oblivious, too. She stood at the table, her hands expertly folding t-shirts into neat squares. He was mesmerized.

She finished with her laundry and stacked the shirts into a white basket. It wasn’t until she started towards the door that he snapped out of it. His feet brought him to stand in front of a washer, and his hands began to grab at the white clothes he had sorted into his own bag after he had paid for the machine’s use. He kept his gaze on the door while he mindlessly threw his laundry into the machine.

The woman walked out the door, and she never even saw him.

He tried to smother his disappointment by pouring detergent and fabric softener into the machine and pressed the start button. While his whites whirled in the washer, Adrien settled down at an empty table. His physics book quietly pattered against the wood, and he was soon drowning in a sea of numbers. The woman was forgotten quickly enough, but when a tiny chime notified him that his laundry had finished, he found that all his whites were now a lovely pink color, a color that reminded him of the woman’s t-shirt.

He cursed himself. Had he not been distracted, he may have caught the stray red sock before it ever made it into the wash.

 

***

The second time he saw her, she did see him.

After literature class that Thursday, he had spent an hour at a ridiculous study group with Nino and a few others from the class. He called it ridiculous because it was exactly that. Normally, his study methods were straight forward. Notes, online lectures, discussion, those were his ordinary tools. He supposed he should’ve expected something different from a group that Nino was a part of.

Their method of studying was much more… creative. And fun, Adrien had to admit.

That week, their study was dedicated to classic English literature, and the author they had to pay attention to was Edgar Allan Poe. The group decided to make things interesting by having each person analyze one of author’s stories and share that analysis by dressing up in an outfit that represented that story in some way—whether it be a concrete or symbolic way.

Adrien had been chosen to analyze The Black Cat, so dressing up hadn’t been difficult. With black cat ears perched atop his blond head, a black turtleneck sweater, and a black collar (complete with a shiny golden bell) around his throat, he gave a flawless breakdown on Poe’s short story and his use of an unreliable narrator. The silliness he felt at first eventually faded, and he found himself enjoying study group for the first time in a while, as literature had never been his favorite subject.

He hadn’t thought twice when he walked to his apartment and grabbed his dirty laundry without bothering to change. He had totally forgotten about the costume until he had already stepped inside the laundromat.

Everyone’s eyes were on him the moment he opened the door.

As a model, Adrien was fairly used to attention. His campaigns were seen by many Parisians, so he tended be recognized everywhere he went. When he was a teenager, the attention made him flush, and anxiety often creeped into his mind. But as he got older, he grew into it. Star-struck stares and excited whispers became the norm. Standing in the entrance of the laundromat, however, he felt himself being drawn back into his adolescent ways.

Had it only been faceless strangers hanging around in the room, he would’ve been able to go on without a care.

His bad luck got the best of him that day, though, and he found that it wasn’t just strangers that were staring. Now, he had finally caught the eye of the girl who had once stolen his attention and caused him to turn an entire load of white laundry pink. She was mere meters away from him, heading towards the door with that same white basket balanced on her hip. Her hair was styled the same way, but today, she was wearing a pink, floral dress.

His cheeks burned red as her gaze traveled from his feet to his head. She wasn’t checking him out in the way he normally saw, no. It wasn’t a scrutinizing gaze, nor was it a flirty observation. No judgment could be seen in her impossibly blue eyes (bluer than the heavens, he realized. He could swim in those irises for days). No, this gaze was different. The corners of her delicate lips curved up, and amusement sparkled in her eyes.

Her stare hovered at the cat ears a moment longer. Then, she finally made eye contact. His green eyes had never been so wide, he was sure of it. His heartbeat was a hummingbird in his chest, racing to see what she would say. This woman—the woman of his dreams, he was sure—was looking right at him and smirking and he didn’t think he could handle the anticipation any longer. He watched as her lips parted, and he waited to hear her words.

“Nice ears,” she said. Even her voice was beautiful, he swore to himself. “If I see you again, I guess I should call you Chat Noir.”

Aaaand he was dead. Just like that, this woman had grasped his heart and stolen it from his body. He couldn’t even complain, either, for he was too dazed. He blinked and sputtered, “I—I, uh, I…”

“Don’t strain yourself,” she laughed.

Nope, that was it. Her laugh was truly a gift from above, one that buried him six feet under. It was more melodious than any song he had ever learned on piano, more beautiful than any language that had ever grazed his tongue, more captivating than any spell ever uttered by a witch. That laugh held his heart captive in her hands.

“It was for a literature class thing. I had to dress in an outfit according to an English story, and I chose ‘The Black Cat’ by Edgar Allan Poe,” he explained, feeling a shameful urge to explain his absurd get-up.

Without missing a beat, she said, “The least you could do is wear an eye patch to signify the missing eye. I would also recommend using rope for a collar, but I feel that’d be slightly morbid, depending on the setting of your class. Then again, the story itself is pretty morbid, so…”

He felt his jaw open as his mouth hung agape. Who was she? “Are you a fan of English literature?”

The woman shook her head and shifted the basket to her other hip. “Not particularly. I just know a few pieces due to a class I had once,” she explained.

“Oh, did you have Monsieur Roux as a literature teacher?” He asked. He had assumed that she attended the same university because she looked about his age and she lived nearby (or so he assumed, because he didn’t know anyone who would go out of their way to go to a laundromat). Most young adults around attended either the same university or one nearby.

When the woman shook her head again, doubt clouded his mind. He supposed he had read that one wrong. Perhaps she wasn’t even close in age to him—Oh, God, what if she was a thirty year old? Or a teenager?

“It wasn’t a literature class. It was an art class. We had to draw inspiration from literature,” she told him.

“Oh, so you’re an art major?”

She smirked. “You’re a curious little cat, aren’t you? You should be careful. Curiosity did kill the cat, you know,” she said. There was a pause, and he was tempted to fill in the other half of the common expression, but she continued before he had the chance, “and satisfaction doesn’t _always_ bring it back.”

Something burst in his stomach, a feeling he had never felt before. It pulsed through his veins and left him feeling anxious yet brave. He could’ve taken on the world, he supposed, so long as she just kept talking to him. He couldn’t wait to tell Nino about this girl, whoever she was.

But then, she turned to leave, and a new feeling surged through his limbs. He didn’t want her to walk away. He didn’t want to say goodbye. What if he never saw her again? That just couldn’t be. She was special, he was sure of it, and he wanted to get to know her.

Fate decided to play a hand, and he watched as a piece of clothing fall from her basket. Just as it reached the floor, he picked it up, not bothering to look at what it was.

“Wait!” He said.

Her hand was on the door, ready to push it open, but she paused. She looked to him, and he closed the gap between them. She raised an eyebrow expectantly.

“You dropped…” he began, glancing to the article of clothing in his hand. It was a pair of ladybug-printed underwear he waved in the air. That was almost too cute for him to handle. “You dropped these. If you’re going to call me Chat Noir based on my outfit, perhaps I should call you Ladybug.”

Her face turned pinker than the flowers on her dress.

If he thought he was a goner before, he was wrong, because in that moment, he officially died. Soon enough, his body would follow suit and the police would be called to investigate the case of the stolen heart.

It shouldn’t have been possible for one woman to be so… so… oh, no human language had a word that could accurately describe her. Adorable, beautiful, wonderful, breath-taking were all close adjectives, but he didn’t think a single word could capture all he saw in her. _Potential_ , he thought. _She has so much potential._

“What?” He asked. It was his turn to smirk. “Cat got your tongue? Or should I say… cat got your panties?”

Her eyes widened, and she snatched the underwear from his paws.

“I should be going. I have a… a thing to do,” she said, turning away from him. He could’ve sworn he heard a soft _oh my god_ muttered under her breath as she made her exit.

He smiled to himself as he walked to the washers. Everyone had stopped staring at that point, so he was free to be giddy in his little corner. His face was still hot as he threw his laundry into the washer—he was more careful about it this time, though. No more pink-colored clothing for him—and his mind was filled with the image of blue.

Something told him that he would be seeing his Ladybug soon enough.

Until then, he had to confide in his best friend.

 

***

“Let me get this straight,” Nino said, leaning his elbow on the table as he leaned forward. Adrien was seated across from him, fork twirling in a bowl of pasta. A lovesick look was present on his model face. “You’ve been to the laundromat twice, you talked to this girl for three minutes, and you’re in love?”

“When you say it like that, it seems bad…” Adrien pouted.

“Dude, you know nothing about her. You don’t know her age, where she goes to school, if she even goes to school, her name… Adrien, you don’t even know her name!” Nino exclaimed. The blond cast his eyes and raised his shoulders like a scolded puppy, and Nino sighed. “I’m sure she’s an awesome girl, but I just think that you need to get to know her better before you profess your love for her.”

“It’s true love, Nino!” Adrien exclaimed. His grin gave away that he was joking, and Nino shook his head. They laughed until the expression melted into something softer. “But really, I know it sounds crazy, but there’s something special about her. She was confident and flirty, but in two seconds, she was blushing and flustered and cute and she’s taken my breath away both times I’ve seen her. I have this desire to get to know her better. Like, I want to know everything about her. I want to know her favorite color and what books have made her cry and where she goes to escape. I just want to know her.”

Nino smiled. “You’re such a sap,” he huffed. “All those tabloids have tried digging into your life to find your dirty laundry and none of them will be able to find any because you’re literally the most pure romantic out there.”

“’Dirty laundry’? Did you just pun?” Adrien asked, grinning like a child.

“What can I say? You’re rubbing off on me,” the other man said.

The two men shared a laugh and took a bite from their plates, and Adrien couldn’t help but feel jealousy stab his heart. The greasy french fries and delicious quiche on Nino’s plate mocked him. Pasta, greens, and lean, grilled chicken decorated his own plate, but the portion sizes were all too small. Well, technically, they were perfect portions for the diet he was following, but they were too small to satisfy his hunger.

“Nino?” Adrien asked, looking up at his friend as he pushed a noodle with his fork. “Can I try some of that quiche?”

Nino smirked. “You want a quiche from me?”

Adrien winced, scrunching his nose. It was a terribly childlike gesture for a grown man. “I love you, man, but that one was bad. Don’t keep that one in your book of puns. I’m pretty sure your girlfriend would punch you for it.”

The tan-skinned man frowned, resting his chin in his hand. “Yeah, you’re right. I suppose it would be a bad idea to trap Marinette under the mistletoe and ask her for a quiche instead of a kiss…. Damn. I was hoping for free food during the holiday seasons. Her parents are the best bakers.”

“Marinette? I thought you were dating Alya?” Adrien said, raising an eyebrow.

Nino straightened his back and dropped his hand onto the table. “I _am_ dating Alya. Marinette is Alya’s best friend. The three of us have known each other since collège. Marinette’s parents own a bakery, and trust me, they make the most amazing macarons and croissants and quiche. Actually, they’re the best at baking. I’ll have to introduce you to the Dupain-Chengs. They’re chill, and honestly, I think you’d get on well with Marinette. She’d fall for you in no time.”

Adrien shook his head and sank his fork into the flaky crust of the quiche. “My heart has already been stolen by a girl with ladybug underwear,” he said before shoveling the food into his mouth. His eyes widened at the taste. _And maybe food had a piece of his heart as well…_

 

***

“Where are you going so quickly?” Julien asked, watching as Adrien frantically shoved his book into his bag. Study group for literature had just ended, and Adrien usually stuck around to chat with Nino and a few friends in the group. Julien, an eighteen-year-old with brown, curly hair, was one of those friends and sat behind Adrien in class.

“I have… plans…” Adrien said. He furrowed his eyebrows, his head bobbing in every direction as he searched for the pen he had lost.

Maeva, a woman with a purple bob, smirked. “Does Agreste have a date, perhaps?”

His eyes brightened when he saw a flash of silver. He plucked the pen from its spot on the ground, put it in his bag, and stood. “Nope,” he answered Maeva.

His two classmates looked to Nino; he was leaning back in his seat with his hands behind his head and his right ankle resting on his left knee. His gaze followed Adrien, a hint of amusement lighting up those golden-brown eyes. Adrien all but sprinted out of the room.

“What’s up with him?” Maeva asked.

“Oh, he just has some laundry to do,” Nino replied. He sat up in his seat and turned to Julien. “I don’t suppose you have an extra copy of the next novel we’re discussing? I don’t exactly have the money to buy my own because I took Alya out to dinner last night.”

Julien raised an eyebrow. “You went on a date with your girlfriend instead of buying the book you need for class?”

“I know. The things we do for love… And they say romance is dead,” Nino scoffed.

Adrien had already made it out of the building by the time the others began to pack up and leave the library. He rushed to his apartment, grabbed his clothes and laundry supplies, and made his way to the laundromat. He was determined to catch his Ladybug before she left.

By the time he arrived, out of breath and almost sweating, she was pulling her laundry from a dryer. With a smile, he slowed his pace and took a place at the washer across from her. They were face-to-face, and he couldn’t have been happier.

“Good afternoon, Ladybug!” He greeted her cheerfully. The smile he wore took up his entire face.

The woman jumped back, startled by his sudden outburst. Clutching a pillowcase to her heart, she looked up, and he watched her surprise turn into a glare. She tossed the pillowcase at him. “Chat Noir! You can’t just scare people like that!”

He supposed he had been a bit loud. The place was all-too-quiet. Not a sound could be heard, save for the whirl of machines and the serious voice of a reporter on the screen behind her. “My a- _paw_ -logies, my Lady. I didn’t realize my voice could frighten you so,” he said, handing her the pink pillowcase.

She blinked twice before narrowing her eyes at him. “Did you just…”

“What?” He asked. “Not a fan of puns?”

“Are you?” She asked in turn.

“Of course!” Adrien said with a toothy grin. He looked more like a puppy than a cat, and Ladybug voiced this. “I’m not cat-like enough? _Meowch_! I’m hurt! I suppose I should work on that, hm?”

Her expression went flat. “Maybe you should work on your sense of humor. I’ve definitely met dogs and cats funnier than you.”

“You wound me,” he said, though his smile remained. A moment of silence passed between them, and he watched her struggle to fold a fitted bedsheet. “Need help?” He offered.

She looked up at him, bringing her bottom lip to rest between her teeth. Every time he saw her, she was just finding new ways to kill him. If he didn’t pay attention to her lips before, he did now. He forced himself to keep eye contact as she spoke, “That’d be nice.”

He stepped around to her and held two corners of the sheet. She glanced at him, expecting him to start folding, but he stood still instead. She raised her eyebrows in a silent _What’s up?_ “I…I don’t exactly know how to do this,” he admitted bashfully. He looked down at his orange sneakers.

“You… Really?” She asked.

He nodded. It took a few moments for him to lift his gaze again. “I… I lived a sheltered life until very recently. _This_ is kind of new to me, all of it,” he said, gesturing around the laundromat. “I only learned how to do laundry a month ago, and I’m still getting the grasp of other adult responsibilities. Cooking and cleaning? It’s… it’s a learning experience.”

To his surprise, she didn’t laugh like Nino would have. She didn’t ask questions like everyone else would have. No, this girl smiled. “Being an adult is a pretty scary thing. I don’t know if I could do it blindly. It’s always nice to have a little help from friends,” she said. She grasped the edges of the sheet. “You start like this.”

He followed her movements as she went through the steps. Hands inside the sheet, fingertips to the seam, twist, and bring the ends together. It took a couple tries, but soon, they had a perfectly folded bedsheet.

“Well, that’s the last of my laundry. I should be going now,” she said, placing the pink sheet at the top of the pile in her white basket. Adrien could feel his shoulders deflate. Though they hadn’t been there long, he still felt that urge to get to know her. He would’ve asked to keep talking, but his shyness held his tongue in its grasp. She smiled at him once again before picking up her basket and moving towards the door.

He lowered his head in defeat and walked to the washer. He began to pull his bag of coins from his pocket, but his fingers grabbed at thin air. In his excitement to see her, he must have forgotten his coins. Adrien turned to the door. “Ladybug, wait!” He called out.

Her feet stopped moving, and she turned to look at him. Her blue eyes were wide, expectant.

“C-Can I borrow some coins? I, uh, forgot to grab some, and I don’t have any cash with me…” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. What a lame excuse to keep talking, she must have thought. He sure felt it was lame. He did want to keep talking, but he felt embarrassed that it was to ask for money. What could he learn about her then? Her generosity?

She strolled over to him. After placing her basket on top of the washer next to his, she stuck her hands into her pocket. A few moments later, she held out a handful of coins for him. His hand hovered under hers, and their skin made contact as she dropped the money into his palm. The coins were warm—or perhaps that was just her hand. Her skin was soft, he knew that much.

He also knew that he wanted hold her hand for real. He wanted to press his palm to hers and intertwine their fingers.

“Fashion design major,” Ladybug said, her voice barely a whisper. He tilted his head in confusion. She didn’t meet his eyes. “I’m a fashion design major, not an art major.”

“Physics for me,” Adrien replied. He didn’t take his eyes off of her. “I’m majoring in physics.”

She lifted her head and met his gaze. Her expression was soft, similar to the one she wore when he told her he didn’t know how to fold bedsheets. “A physics major, huh?” Again, there wasn’t any judgment laced in her voice. She was merely curious.

“I haven’t decided on a special type. I’m torn between molecular and astrophysics,” he said.

“I could see you being either, though I think you might have more options for puns if you’re an astrophysicist,” she said.

His face lit up. _She understood him!_

“Bye, Chat. See you next week,” she said, waving goodbye. She picked up her basket and went on her way. He stood with his mouth slightly agape, his mind grasping for some comprehension.

She was amazing, he concluded.

And he was going to see her next week because they had become a constant in each other’s routines.

_He was going to see her next week!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> eyyy  
> new story, un-beta'd and probably full of errors as always!  
> it'll probably be a short story, less than ten chapters, but chapters will be at least 5k  
> (I'm v bad at long chapters and I'm trying to improve with that)
> 
> hope you enjoyed!  
> in the next chapter, we'll get to see this world through Marinette's eyes
> 
> -Cat


	2. ii. October

Marinette had grown two heads.

At least, that’s how Alya made it seem with her wide eyes and gaping mouth. She stared at her best friend as if she had just admitted that she was a murderer. The two of them were lounging on the couch in their shared apartment, chatting over tea, when Marinette told her about Chat Noir. The other woman didn’t react in the way she expected. No, she adjusted her glasses, raised an eyebrow, and said, “You’re telling me that you are in love with a man you’ve spoken to twice?”

“I didn’t say I was in love!” Marinette rushed to her defense. She was sure that the word _love_ had never crossed her tongue. That would’ve been crazy! Though she was a sucker for romance stories of all kinds, she knew that the ‘love at first sight’ trope was a bit exaggerated. And though this man was cute, it wasn’t his looks that drew her in. “I just think he seems like a nice guy.”

“Okay, so you aren’t in love with him. But it’s still a little insane. He sounds too good to be true. Cute, smart, _and_ innocent? That guy probably has some serious skeletons in his closet,” Alya said.

“He’s a giant nerd!” Marinette exclaimed, clutching her mug tighter to her chest. “He likes puns and he wants to be a molecular physicist or an astrophysicist. When I first met him, he was dressed as a cat. He didn’t even know how to fold bedsheets. He _totally_ screams menacing.”

“Hm,” her friend pondered. Her eyes were cast to the side and her finger tapped against her chin.

Marinette narrowed her eyes. “What are you thinking?”

Alya smirked. “Oh, nothing,” she said, sing-song. “It’s just that this guy doesn’t seem like your type. Puns? Physics? Childlike? Those certainly don’t sound like the things that would attract Marinette, Miss I-Love-Art-Boys.”

“And you see where loving the artistic types gets me,” the raven-haired woman muttered. Only two months prior, she had gone through a breakup with her boyfriend of five months, Sam. Sam was two years older than her and an art major. Their relationship had never been the strongest to begin with. They had met in Monsieur Pierre’s art class, in which they made pieces inspired by various writings and events and feelings. They, coincidentally, chose “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allan Poe as their dark English literature inspiration. The two pieces had turned out completely different, but Marinette’s had earned a higher grade. Sam hadn’t been happy that a second-year girl had done better than he had, so he began talking to Marinette with intentions of finding out something dirty about her.

Instead of uncovering her deepest, darkest secrets, he fell in love with her.

But then, after only a few months of dating, he fell in love with Camille. Marinette didn’t find out that he was cheating until the affair had been going on for two months. A red thong on his bedroom floor had given him away. Marinette didn’t own anything that saucy at the time. (Doubt had moved into her mind, making her wonder if he cheated because she wasn’t sexy enough. Most of her underwear _was_ pink with lace and bows and cute patterns. Once they broke up, she went out and bought three new sets of lingerie that she had yet to wear).

Before Sam, she dated Liam. It was her first year at university. She was eighteen, and he was a poet who frequented the same café at which she often got her tea.

She had been sitting at a table alone, sipping lavender and honey tea. Her sketchbook was open in front of her, and the page facing up displayed a half-finished sketch of a coat. Liam was there with a group of friends, but he slipped away from them to ask her to return on Thursday for an upcoming poetry slam he was reading in.

She did return. She hadn’t been expecting much when she walked through those café doors—how much could she expect from a hipster boy in a beanie, knitted scarf, and distressed skinny jeans? Liam had pleasantly surprised her, though. His poetry was unlike anything she had ever heard. The first one was about the shift from childhood to adulthood, the second one was based on a memory, and the third one was inspired by a nameless face sitting alone, a face that took his breath away. The third poem he presented was about Marinette.

Thinking back on it, she should’ve seen that it was terribly cliché, but she was too blinded by those beautiful words. He had made the most mundane events seem ethereal, and he had seemed so at peace while speaking. After the reading was over, they stayed in that little café and chatted over mugs of cold coffee until the employees shoved them out and closed up. Their adventure didn’t end there that night. They went for a walk, he kissed her, they went back to his apartment and spent the night kissing and talking and sharing stories.

She was his muse for a few poems, and he was her muse for a few sketches.  

They dated for just over a year, and at a year, the spark died out. Like most artists, then, they moved on.

Back in lycée, she had dated Nathanaël. That one had been a short relationship. Nathanaël was a shy artist in her class, and they had been friends for a few years. He was the first boy to show an interest in her… well, that she noticed, anyway. Alya and Nino always told her that half the class had a crush on her at one point, but Marinette never believed that. Nathanaël was a total sweetheart, but she didn’t return his strong feelings, no matter how badly she wanted to. She had tried to date him in hopes that she would develop something more than platonic, but she could only ever see him as a friend. Remaining friends hadn’t been easy for either of them. Nathanaël, though he understood, was heartbroken, and Marinette felt guilty. Eventually, they overcame the awkwardness and went back to their ordinary friendship.

So all of her previous relationships were with artistic-type guys, and all of her previous relationships failed.

It was just her luck, she supposed.

“I’m not saying that I’m going to date this guy. I don’t even know his name,” Marinette said.

Alya nearly choked on her drink. Her body reacted with a fit of rough coughs, and for a moment, Mari was concerned. Alya simply pushed through the coughs and asked, “Every Thursday, a cute guy flirts with you and teases you, and you haven’t asked his name? This guy has seen your most childish pair of underwear, and he’s still flirting with you! Mari, he likes you!! Why have you not learned his name?”

Marinette bit her lip and hid her face in the sleeves of her sweater. She knew her friend was not going to like what she had to say, “It makes me nervous that we’re meeting on Thursdays. Thursdays seem sacred. Liam’s poetry slams took place on Thursdays, and Pierre’s class was on Thursdays. It was a Thursday when I discovered that Sam was cheating.”

Right on cue, Alya waved her hand. Her ombre hair bobbed from side to side as she shook her head. “You’re such a superstitious sap.”

Marinette couldn’t argue with that. She knew she was superstitious, though not in the ordinary way. She could walk under ladders or cross paths with a black cat. Breaking a mirror was one she was wary of, but most of her superstitions were those of her mind’s own making. She thought Thursdays were bad luck, so she made sure that no major events were scheduled for that day of the week. She had a special blue pencil that she used for every exam she took, and she had a special pink pen for final drafts of designs. She had a pair of lucky socks (ankle socks, red with black polka dots), but she only wore them on ordinary days, or days when she had no special plans.

She was superstitious, but was there any harm in that?

“The superstition isn’t even what’s getting in my way,” Marinette confessed. She looked down at her almost-empty mug and mumbled, “I actually like the mystery.”

She didn’t have to look up to know that Alya was smirking. She heard it in her words. “What was that?” Her friend asked.

Marinette exhaled and met her friend’s eyes. “I like the mystery. I like the anticipation. He could be anyone, Alya, and I can be anyone. We don’t have names to define us. I can be cool and flirt with this attractive guy without stumbling like Marinette usually would.”

The playful aura in Alya’s hazel eyes faded into something with more fire. “Marinette’s amazing, and she’s totally capable of flirting with a man without having to hide behind an alias.”

“It’s not an insecurity thing,” Marinette tried to say. Alya narrowed her eyes, and the raven-haired woman sighed. “Okay, it may be an insecurity thing. But I’m _human_ , Al. We all feel insecure from time to time. I still think that I’m a beautiful, kickass woman. I just have some flaws that hinder me from branching out as much as I’d like.”

“Damn right you’re a beautiful, kickass woman,” Alya grumbled, satisfied with her friend’s reply. She placed a hand on Marinette’s shoulder. “It’ll be difficult, but I know that _Marinette_ can be just as flirty and confident as her Ladybug persona. You’ve got it in you. You just have to work for it.”

Marinette’s lips twitched into a smile, and an itchy feeling spread through her body. She practically jumped to place her mug on the coffee table before scooping her friend into a tight hug. “I love you, you know. You’re the best friend ever, and I think you’re a beautiful, kickass woman, too.”

“Damn right I am!” Alya exclaimed. Her breath tickled Marinette’s ear as she chuckled. Closing her eyes, she leaned into the embrace and whispered, “I love you, too.”

 

***

 

Late.

She was late.

It was the first Thursday in November, and it was twenty minutes after four, almost two hours past the time she normally arrived. Chat Noir had probably already showed up, as it was usually four o’clock when he walked through the door.

 _See you next week_ , she had said. She hoped he didn’t think she was ditching him.

She hadn’t meant sleep through the afternoon, honestly. She hadn’t meant to give in to her exhaustion from staying up to finish two outfits she was commissioning. Immediately after dropping off those outfits to the customer at nine o’clock, she went back to her apartment and crashed on the couch. She meant to set an alarm, but sleep had pulled her under before she had the chance.

So Marinette slept through the morning and most of the afternoon. She missed her marketing class, and she was destined to miss her night class, too. None of that mattered to her, though. She just didn’t want to miss meeting with Chat. Her last words to him held a promise, and she wasn’t one for breaking her promises .

She left the apartment, and her laundry basket was heavy with all of her clothes and sheets and towels. Usually, she and Alya took turns washing bedsheets and towels, but her best friend had been busy with researching for a new article she was posing for the university paper. Alya was either attached to her laptop at home, working in class, sorting through books in the library, or spending time with her boyfriend. There wasn’t any time for laundry, and that left Marinette to do it all.

But she refused to let her steps be slowed by the weight of the basket. Everyone she passed on the streets probably thought she was crazy; it was an unusual sight to see, a tiny girl treading along on the sidewalk with a basket bigger than herself. She was getting a lot of stares.

Soon enough, she was standing in front of the laundromat. Through the window, she could see Chat. He had his back to her, and he was transferring his clothes into a dryer. She took a deep breath, pushed away her sudden butterflies, and opened the door.

He didn’t notice her until she placed her laundry basket on top of the machine beside him.

“Hey, Chat,” she said, slightly out of breath from her determined power walk.

The blond man turned, but his face didn’t light up as she expected. Instead, his shoulders remained slump and a frown tugged at the corners of his lips.

She felt as if someone had punched her in the gut. Had she caused this?

“I… I’m sorry I’m late. I stayed up working on a design, and I crashed this morning. I accidentally slept through the day, but I came as soon as I could and…” She trailed off. His eyes were distant, telling her that he wasn’t listening to her rambling. Perhaps her ego had been a bit too big. Marinette placed her hand on his arm. “What’s wrong?”

“I-I haven’t had a good day. I’m sorry,” he sighed, turning back to his laundry.

Marinette frowned. “You don’t have anything to apologize for. Do you want to talk about it?”

He glanced around the room, and she couldn’t help but do the same. It was a quiet afternoon, as it usually was. There were only a few other people in the laundromat, and each one of them was occupied by laundry or books or the news that played on the television screen. It was fairly quiet, other than the rattle of machines.

“I got into a fight with my father. We… we disagree about what my future should look like. I want to study physics and see where life takes me. Maybe I could meet someone and settle down with kids. But my father wants me to continue his legacy. He’s a big name in this world, and he wants me to add to that name. He wants me to be big, but I just want a low-key life, if that’s even possible at this point,” Chat said, his voice dropping to a murmur for his last statement. He probably hadn’t meant for her to hear it, but she did. As if it mattered, though, because she didn’t quite grasp the meaning behind his words. All she caught was a disagreement between the young man and his father.

Marinette opened her mouth to reply, but Chat spoke before she had the chance. His cheeks were tinted pink and he seemed embarrassed as he said, “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to unload on you like this.”

“Again, you’re apologizing for nothing. It’s good to vent. Bottling up negative feelings only makes you more susceptible to pain,” Marinette said. She was one to talk. While she knew she could tell Alya anything, Marinette had a tendency to push things to the back of her mind when she was upset. It wasn’t as much of a ‘I don’t want to bother anyone with my problems’ thing as it was a ‘I just really don’t want to think about it’ thing. Of course, it always came back to haunt her, for those problems piled up until she broke. But a few days later, she would be okay, for the most part.

“How very wise you are, Buginette,” Chat said, smiling softly. “A young lady with a wise soul, hm?”

 _Buginette?_ Marinette pondered. It didn’t sound so bad.

“I wouldn’t exactly say wise, just experienced,” Marinette said, her cheeks flushed.

“Oh? And what matters would ever upset my lady?” Chat asked. The sadness had somewhat faded, now replaced by a flirtatious look, but she could still see that his usual spark wasn’t there.

“I believe that’s a subject for another day. Today, we should focus on you,” she said, carefully avoiding speaking of herself. That was one more problem shuffled to the back of her mind. “I’m sorry you and your father have such different views. Maybe one day he can realize that your happiness is worth more than any fortune attached to a name.”

Marinette’s parents were bakers. When she was young, before she showed interest in fashion, her parents had presumed that Marinette would take over the family business. However, as soon as she announced her aspiration to be a designer, the Dupain-Chengs immediately offered their support. They encouraged her to do as she wanted. Their business was their own; if their daughter wanted to find her own destiny, they would cheer for her. They were proud of her, no matter what.

All her life, she had been loved unconditionally.

She couldn’t imagine anything different than the support she received.

“That’s a big maybe,” Chat exhaled, pressing the start button on the machine.

She didn’t like this side of Chat Noir. She enjoyed his cheerful eyes and innocent smile. She enjoyed his enthusiasm and his naïveté. He reminded Marinette of an excitable puppy. Now, he seemed so sad. She just wanted to wrap him in her arms and hold him in a warm embrace.

“Hey, do you wanna go somewhere?” Marinette asked.

Chat raised an eyebrow. “Shouldn’t we wait to do our laundry?”

“The laundry will still be here when we get back. Come on, it’ll give us something to do while everything is washing,” she said, tugging on his arm. “I’ll make you a deal. You help me put all this in the wash and I’ll buy you food. I know this great café that’s just two blocks away.”

“You had me at food,” Chat grinned. He moved to pick up her laundry basket and grunted as he struggled to hold it up. He probably hadn’t been expecting it to weigh so much. “Do you always carry this much? How fit are you?”

Marinette giggled. “It’s heavier today because I had to pick up slack from my roommate. She’s supposed to wash sheets when I have towels and vice versa, but she didn’t quite have the time this week,” she explained, opening the washer door.

“Oh,” he replied.

With their combined work, they managed to get all the laundry into the wash. Then, they left the clothes to spin in soapy water and made their way down the street.

The café was the same at which she had met Liam, but she wanted to overlook her superstition. She was bigger than her fears. The café wasn’t like the laundromat, quiet and boring. There was always something going on in the little shop. Live music, poetry slams, and various community activities were always happening. Even when it was an ordinary day, mindless chatter filled the space. The air always smelled like coffee grounds, and warmth always wrapped customers in a fuzzy blanket.

On days when her mind was busy and silence was deafening, the café was a perfect place to be.

It seemed to be the perfect place for Chat Noir, too.

The moment he stepped into the dimly-lit restaurant, his face softened. When they were seated at a table, his shoulder relaxed. Finally, when their mugs were placed before them, his lips curled into a smile. He was closer to being himself.

“How did you find this place? This is amazing!” Chat exclaimed. He eyed the design crafted into his cappuccino before bringing it to his lips. A layer of white foam lined his upper lip when he put the mug down.

Marinette giggled. “You have some, uh…” She said, gesturing towards his mouth. He blushed, casting his eyes to the table, and wiped the foam from his face. “You got it. I found this place a couple years ago, when I was a freshman in university. It began as a study place for me. The library is too quiet, and my roommate tends to be a bit unpredictable.”

“It must be nice to have a roommate, though. I live on my own. I wanted to live with my best friend, but he already has a roommate,” Chat said, his lips twitching into a half-frown.

“How did you meet your best friend? Did you go to school with him?” Marinette asked.

Chat shifted in his seat. “Actually, I was homeschooled my entire life. I never attended school with others until I enrolled in university this year. I met Ni—I mean, my best friend, I met my best friend when I was fifteen. He showed up to one of my fencing matches to support another friend, and he went into the locker room to find that friend, but he got confused by all the masks. I helped him find his friend, he invited me to hang out with them after the match, I snuck away from my bodygua—my supervision, and we had fun,” he said. He looked to her, continuing when he found that she was giving him her undivided attention, “My father has always been pretty protective, so I never had a lot of friends as a kid. My best friend kept me sane through the years.”

“Honestly, I don’t know if my best friend has helped or harmed my sanity. She drives me crazy, but I can’t imagine being so close with anyone else. We balance each other out in the best way,” Marinette told him, releasing a breathless life

Alya was the best friend Marinette needed. She was honest and straight-forward; she didn’t dance around her feelings or thoughts. Communication was one of Alya’s strengths while it was one of Marinette’s weaknesses. She was perceptive and insightful; she knew how to put things into a new perspective, which was something Marinette overlooked at times. She was loud and fun; she was the life of a party. Confidence was no stranger, and eventually, it rubbed off on Marinette. With Alya cheering her on, Marinette learned to stand up for others and for herself. She learned how to take risks and believe in herself.

But the need for a best friend wasn’t a one-sided ordeal. Alya needed Marinette just as much. Where Alya was rash, Marinette liked to devise plans. While Alya didn’t easily admit to being wrong, Marinette apologized for her mistakes almost immediately after realizing her wrongdoing. Sometimes, Alya was independent to the point she didn’t accept help when needed, but Marinette helped her see that it was okay to depend on people. Accepting help didn’t translate into weakness. It was just the opposite, really. Accepting help meant that one was strong enough to lay down their pride and admit that they needed others.

The two argued and bickered sometimes, but at the end of the day, they were two halves of an imperfect whole. Their friendship was forged from the same fate that decided soulmates. No, scratch that, they _were_ soulmates. They were _platonic_ soulmates, but soulmates nonetheless. It was meant to be.

Marinette was aware that she tended to sound a bit crazy sometimes. She was superstitious and held an unwavering belief in fate and destiny. She wanted to see the good in people. She believed in things like soulmates.

That’s just who she was.

“Also, you fenced? Do you still practice?” Marinette asked.

“I still practice, but I don’t participate in competitions anymore. It’s more to keep in shape, and it’s a familiar sport,” he said. “Do you have any hobbies like fencing?”

As he picked up his mug of coffee, Marinette thought. She generally didn’t play sports because of her tendency to be clumsy and trip over her own two feet. She and Alya went running twice a week, but most of her exercise was in the comfort of her own apartment. There was only one hobby that stuck out in her mind, and though it was embarrassing, she said it anyway, “When I was younger, I was pretty good with yoyo tricks.”

He raised an eyebrow, a smirk making its way onto his face, and Marinette knew she made a mistake in sharing that. “Yoyo tricks? The stunning, aspiring fashion designer Ladybug once enjoyed playing with a yoyo?”

“Hey, I was pretty good!” She exclaimed in her defense. Heat flooded her face, but she told herself that it was the steam from her tea and certainly not Chat calling her _stunning_. “Other than that one time I hit myself in the face…”

Chat laughed, loud and joyful, and it made her heart sing. She didn’t even notice that she was smiling and laughing with him.

“You’re funny, Ladybug,” the man said, peering at her through green eyes. “I actually was afraid you weren’t going to show up today. I was looking forward to seeing you.”

“I’m really sorry I was late. I ended up pulling an all-nighter to finish a gown and suit I was commissioning for one of my friend's colleagues, and I fell asleep this morning. I even slept through a class,” she told him.

Chat tapped his fingers against his mug, grinning. “A dedicated artist.”

“Oh, yes. I’ve pulled a countless amount of all-nighters to work on design projects. Once I get started on an idea, I can’t stop until it’s finished. At least I actually got paid for this design, though. Usually, I blow my paycheck on bills and fabric,” Marinette admitted.

Chat’s eyes brightened. “Oh, what do you do for work?”

“I work in a bakery nearby. My parents own their own, actually, but it’s on the other side of the city.”

“Really? I’d love to work in a place of sweets, but I think my self-control would be tested… and fail,” he laughed.

Marinette’s phone chimed. She glanced at her screen and groaned. “My friend just reminded me that I have class tonight. We should probably head back to the laundromat.”

“Okay,” Chat said. He took a final sip of his coffee, and the mug clinked against the saucer as he set it down. The two adults stood. Before Marinette could fish her wallet from her purse, Chat placed a few bills on the table.

“Hey, what are you doing? I told you I’d pay!” Marinette exclaimed, punching his shoulder lightly.

“Ow!” He said. He clutched his shoulder where he hit her, but his smile told her that he wasn’t actually in pain. “Is that any way to treat the person who just paid for your drink?” He teased.

She glared at him.

Chat Noir held his hands up in surrender, and his chuckle echoed through the restaurant. “Okay, okay. I’m sorry, but I wanted to pay. I owed you. After all, you gave me coins so I could do my laundry last week.”

“Alright,” she sighed. “But next time, I will pay.”

 _Next time_ , she thought to herself. She could already feel the blood rushing to her face. This entire afternoon had felt too much like a date with coffee and tea, questions, and flirting. For a moment, she forgot that she had invited him to the café to cheer him up. At least it worked. He seemed happy now.

“Well, I look forward to next time,” Chat smiled.

She felt her heart flutter in excitement.

She was looking forward to it as well.

 

***

 

The month passed by quickly, and every Thursday, Marinette would meet Chat Noir at the laundromat. She always arrived earlier than he did, but she began to wait until he, too, had finished his laundry before leaving. For almost two hours, they sat and talked about anything and everything. Humorous anecdotes and biggest fears were shared. Secrets were admitted, and topics were discussed. And within it all was an unspoken agreement to keep their true names to themselves. Any information that could’ve hinted at their identity was omitted or changed in those stories.

Marinette grew closer to this nameless man. She knew that his mother had been declared missing for years and that his father had grown cold afterwards. She knew that his father and the people he was surrounded by held him to high expectations. She knew that he had never had many friends, that his father tended to push away anyone he deemed not good enough, and that he had been lonely. She saw the pain of his past to an extent, but she saw the light he emitted, too.

She knew he wanted to be a parent when he grew older. She knew that he was happy to live in his tiny apartment, even if it meant he had to stay with a job he didn’t particularly enjoy, because it meant he could go to school and socialize and _experience_. She knew he loved his best friend more than anyone and would do anything to ensure his happiness. She knew he had a heart bigger than the sun and a soul that shined just as bright.

He was exactly the type of man Marinette could find herself falling in love with.

Meeting him at a Halloween party had been completely coincidental (as if she actually believed that).

The music pulsed through the club. Marinette could feel the bass in her heart, replacing the beat of her organ with an entirely new rhythm. Lights flashed over sweaty bodies on the dance floor and set a spotlight on the artificial spider webs that hung from the ceiling.. Many people had their faces obscured by spooky masks or intricate makeup.

Marinette had dressed up as a witch.

It was a handmade costume, and she had put a lot of effort into it. This party wasn’t an ordinary party. She wasn’t here with Alya or Nino (though she would’ve invited them as her guests if they hadn’t had plans of their own). No, she had been invited by a teaching assistant from her fashion design class. Alice had interned for one of the top designers in Paris, and she held onto some of her contacts. When a model had told her about a Halloween party that was taking place after a collection reveal. Alice caught word that there may have been some designers attending, and she immediately thought to invite Marinette, who would possibly impress or, at the very least, show off her charisma and gain connections of her own.

Marinette knew it was highly unlikely that she be discovered by a designer. After all, it was only a costume. She wasn’t _that_ much of a wishful thinker. But the party gave her a chance to make an impression and build relationships. She was a friendly, amicable girl. Parties weren’t exactly her scene, but if it meant that it would help in her future, she would go happily.

With a pointy black hat, red-poison lips, and extensions in her black hair, she looked absolutely _bewitching_. At least, that’s what a blond in a cat costume told her.

He was wearing a mask that concealed half his face, but the same cat ears were perched atop his head and the same bell-embellished collar hung around his neck. What really gave him away, though, was the pun.

“Chat?” Marinette said, blinking at him.

The man squinted as if trying to see her better in the dark club. “Ladybug?”

“It _is_ you! I knew that only one insufferable cat could make a pun like that,” she grinned.

“You know, I’m going to ignore that insult and instead point out that you aren’t dressed as a ladybug. You missed a perfect opportunity, _Buginette_ ,” he said.

Marinette rolled her eyes playfully. “I revisit my earlier words: insufferable.”

He held his hand to his heart, wincing in “pain,” but his lips were twisted into a smile. “My lady wounds me.”

She smirked. “I’m surprised to see you here, actually.”

“Oh? I’ll have you know, I have friends in high places. Parties like this are only the tip of the ice burg,” Chat bragged, gesturing around the raving club. His arm was in mid-swing when it stopped and the color drained from his face. Marinette’s smile dropped, and she was about to ask him that was wrong when he looked to her and said worriedly, “I didn’t mean to sound like I’m flaunting my status or anything. I was just trying to… I...”

Marinette laughed. He had been concerned about seeming to be show-off? He never acted better than anyone. He never flaunted money or connections. In fact, until seeing him at this party, she had never even thought about his socioeconomic status. He was completely down-to-earth.

“Chat, don’t worry. You never sound that way. I didn't mean to doubt that you're cool or anything. I only meant that it's odd that we’re at the same party, especially when there are a million other parties and this one is so exclusive,” she explained. He probably thought she was rambling, but she only wanted to ease his worry. That, and once she opened her mouth, her filter became nonexistent.

“Oh,” he smiled. “Why, I’m not surprised at all! We’re destined to find each other anywhere we go, even in the most mundane or the most extravagant of places.”

He winked at her, and she nearly melted under the heat of the club lights (because she was definitely _not_ melting under his gaze).

Before either of them said another word, a man dressed as a vampire approached Chat. White fangs flashed as he leaned in and whispered something in his ear, and Marinette watched Chat inhale. The man pulled away, giving him a look, and Chat bumped fists with him. With a twirl of his cape, the man was gone.

“Bad news?” Marinette asked. She bit her lip and hoped that she wasn’t prodding too much.

Chat craned his neck and scanned the crowd, ignoring her question. At once, his entire body went still. He remained frozen for a few seconds before he ducked his head down again. He looked to Marinette, his eyes wide. “I don’t have time to explain, and I apologize if this is a bit forward and awkward, but may I kiss you?”

That surely startled her.

She did want to kiss him, she realized—maybe she had a bigger crush on him than she wanted to admit. But she hadn’t expected this, whatever _this_ was. He obviously wasn’t meaning for it to be a real, genuine kiss. He was probably just wanting to hide from someone or make someone jealous, she suspected. The thought of him using her put a crack in her heart, but just as quickly as it appeared, the thought was waved away. She trusted Chat, and she knew he wouldn’t be asking if it wasn’t urgent.

So, she said yes.

The kiss was much softer than she expected. When he put one hand on the back of her neck, placed the other on her cheek, and pulled her face to his, she had prepared herself for something forceful and heated, but his mouth was pressed ever-so-slightly to hers. His lips were even softer than she imagined they would be, and for a brief moment, she was tempted to ask him what kind of exfoliate or lip balm he used, but she realized that her question was highly inappropriate.  

She was kissing Chat.

Oh, Alya was never going to let her hear the end of it once she heard about this. And of course she’d hear about it; Marinette was terrible at keeping secrets from her best friend, especially when it came to secrets about boys. But she didn’t share all the gory details, unlike Alya.

She felt his tongue press to her lips and it took everything in her not to jump back in surprise. Her brain felt like it was going to explode at any moment. Or perhaps that was her heart…

Just as she parted her lips to deepen the kiss, he pulled away. It took her a moment to realize this fact, and her eyes fluttered open. Her cheeks were aflame now, and there was no hiding it. Actually, her entire body felt as if it were on fire.

His hands lingered on her for a good ten seconds before he realized he was still holding her. He drew his hands away as if touching her burned him. “Sorry,” he apologized. “Yanis informed me that an old friend was looking for me. I do love my friend, but Chloé… she can be a bit… clingy. Once she finds me, she’ll be on me all night. I saw her heading this way, and I was afraid she would be able to recognize me with the mask. I knew she wouldn’t look twice at a couple who was kissing, so… I’m sorry.”

“Chloé?” Marinette repeated, her stomach sinking.

“Chloé Bourgeois. She’s a family friend, and…” He began, but the rest of his words were drowned out by her blood rushing in her ears.

She really hoped he didn't see her face go white. Chloé was someone she had a past with, and if Chloé caught her speaking to someone she was interested in, Marinette was as good as dead. She could end up in a catfight or she could be yelled at in front of all these influential individuals or, worst of all, her true name could be revealed.

If Chat was friends with people like Chloé, he had to be elite. He had to be someone much better than Marinette, a baker’s daughter who was bullied by Chloé during school.

She couldn’t let Chloé see her and Chat together.

She had to go.

“I-I have to go. I just realized that it’s getting late and I need to get back home before…” Marinette stuttered, glancing around them for any sight of the mean-spirited blonde.

“Oh? Well, at least allow me to walk you out to a taxi? I want to make sure you get home okay,” Chat said, his green eyes filling with concern.

Marinette shook her head. Her mouth could barely form words, but she pushed through. “A friend and I are taking the subway back,” she lied. “I’ll be fine.”

His shoulders drooped. “Oh, okay. It was nice seeing you, and thank you! For helping me hide…”

“It was no problem,” Marinette said, looking off in the distance. “I’ll see you soon.”

She didn’t even wait for him to reply; she fled, and it wasn’t until she reached the entrance that she looked back. Chloé had found him, and Marinette was flooded with relief. She was safe.

But on the way home, all Marinette could think about was his lips on hers.

All she could think about was the feeling of his tongue.

All she could think about was how she wanted to kiss him again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yay! another chapter!
> 
> so, I got my wisdom teeth removed yesterday  
> that was a thing.  
> here's hoping for fast healing.  
> I also went to a concert Monday, saw Panic! at the Disco and Weezer and now I have "Jacked Up" stuck in my head  
> you should totally look it up, it's an amazing song
> 
> what are some of your favorite songs?  
> favorite writing/reading music?
> 
> one last thing: any situations you'd like to see in this fic?  
> I can't promise to include every suggestion, but it would be nice having some inspiration  
> also, if you have any mini-fic/drabble requests, you can find my tumblr under the same username (@tonguetiedcat)
> 
> comments? concerns?  
> thanks for reading and leaving kudos <3
> 
> -Cat =^.^=


	3. iii. November

Soon, the bitter cold moved into Paris.

To leave the house without a jacket was nearly impossible on those days where the wind blew and the sun hid behind the clouds. At the university, the courtyard was mostly empty, as no one wanted to hang around outside as they waited for their next class to begin.

Thursday afternoon was particularly cold because of the weeping sky. Rain poured down as Adrien jogged down the street. His hands were occupied by the basket of laundry he carried, so he couldn’t hold an umbrella to protect himself. Raindrops splattered on his shoulders and soaked through his black beanie, and his glasses were fogged, but he kept on.

His heart was heavier than his basket. It had only been a few days since the Halloween party, and he didn’t expect to see Ladybug at the laundromat, not after the awkward kiss-me-so-I-can-hide-from-someone situation. In the days following that disaster, he questioned why he did it and criticized himself for ever putting them in such a position.

He had been wanting to hide from Chloé, but he didn’t know why he thought asking to kiss Ladybug was the best course of action. The moment that question left his lips— _may I kiss you?_ —he was filled with regret. Until she said yes. He could still feel the weight of his heart in his chest and the moisture pooling in his palms.

He had never expected their first kiss to be something that wasn’t even real. And in a club. He had always imagined a romantic situation: a passionate kiss in the rain, an innocent kiss on her doorstep, a sweet kiss at the top of the Eiffel Tower (which was one of her favorite places in Paris because of the view, he had learned). It would be something like the movies, full of sparks and with cheesy music playing in the background. And it would be _real_.

But no, he had to go and fuck up.

The kiss had been nice at least. He had even lost himself for a few moments, forgetting exactly why he was kissing her. Her lips had been so soft, and her mouth had seemed to fit perfectly against his. He could still feel the warmth of her kiss if he thought hard enough. She had brought her hand to rest on the side of his face, the other hovering at his waist. Her eyelashes were long enough to tickle his cheeks.

Maybe it wasn’t as real and romantic as he hoped it to be, but it was damn memorable.

It was probably memorable for her as well, just in a different way.

Adrien remembered how frantic she seemed to get away from him. She had blanched, her pale skin even whiter under the harsh club lights and his gaze, when he apologized and explained that Chloé had been on the hunt for him. She hadn’t been able to get away from him fast enough.

In less than ten minutes, he had managed to ruin everything.

So when he opened the door to the laundromat and stepped inside, he was surprised to see Ladybug standing at a dryer, folding plush towels. He was even more surprised when she looked up and smiled at him. She lifted her hand and waved shyly.

He couldn’t help but return her smile as he placed his laundry basket in front of a washer.

“Hey,” she said.

He replied, “Hi.”

“Looks like you got caught in the rain, too,” she said, eyeing his soaked beanie and rain-splattered shoulders. He noticed that the tips of her pigtails were damp. At a nearby table, a red, black-spotted raincoat was draped across the back of a chair, and on her feet were a pair of matching rain boots. God, she was so…

“Adorable,” he breathed.

“What was that?” Ladybug asked, tilting her head to the side. Her innocent expression told him that she hadn’t heard him, thankfully. His face still flushed, though. He needed to watch himself around her; he had a tendency to say and do stupid things.

“I said yes, I did. I couldn’t carry my umbrella because of my basket,” he said. He shivered.

Ladybug moved toward him with a towel. She stepped in front of him and wrapped the towel around his shoulders. It was still warm from the dryer. As he melted into the heat, she took his beanie and tossed it into his basket.

“It’s cold outside. You should be wearing something warmer,” she told him.

Adrien shrugged. “I would’ve been fine had it not been raining.”

Ladybug laughed, soft and sweet. “All you have is a beanie and a thin coat. No gloves, no scarf, not even a knitted sweater.”

He studied her appearance, taking in her leggings, black dress, and grey cardigan. Her outfit was completed by a red scarf that hugged her neck. She certainly looked cozy and _too freaking cute he couldn’t handle it oh my god._

“I’ll be sure to start dressing warmer, then,” he chuckled.

“Good! I can’t exactly ask you for help with my physics homework if you die of hypothermia,” she said with a nervous smile. It was all toothy and again, cute. She was going to be the death of him.

Adrien smirked. “Ah, so that’s why you’re all concerned? You’re just using me for my brains?”

“You have me all figured out now!” She joked, throwing her hands in the air and making him laugh once again. Her movements were often exaggerated, and it was absolutely captivating to him. Everything about her was captivating. “But really, could you help me? I can usually scamper by with a passing grade on most assignments, but I’m really struggling to understand this one concept.”

“I can try my best,” Adrien promised. “I’ll start this laundry and you open your books, and I’ll see if I can help you through it.”

“Thank you,” she said, smiling at him. He tried to push away the butterflies he felt in his stomach and turned to put his clothes into an empty machine. Coins jingled in his hands as he paid the fee, and a few moments later, the soft whirl of the machine sounded.

Adrien joined her at the table. Her basket was placed on the floor beside her, and she was flipping through the pages of a textbook, a pencil held in the space between her parted lips. His seat creaked as he sat, and she looked up. Her hands stilled and she quickly plucked the pencil from her mouth. He almost didn’t see the rosy color that dusted her cheeks. Almost.

“I’m in my third year of university, and I should’ve taken this class last year, but I was never a fan of physics in collège, and I just pushed it off,” she said mournfully, looking down at the numbers and letters and graphs on her page. Calculus-based physics it was, he supposed. That wasn’t too difficult, not for him.

Her right hand, holding the pencil, hovered over the page of a notebook. He could see her neat script taking up half the page, but when he looked to the top corner, her name was absent. Adrien felt shame pool in his stomach. He had never been that curious to learn her actual name—okay, that was a lie. He was very curious. But in the two months they had known each other, she had never told him her name, so he assumed that she wanted to keep it a secret. He couldn’t really say much about that. He knew what it was like to hide a name. It wasn’t like he introduced himself as _Adrien Agrest_ e to everyone he met because people tended to flip shit when they heard his last name.

He assumed she had her reasons to keep her name a secret, whatever those reasons may have been. He respected her boundaries, but now, just days after he had over-stepped normal boundaries and asked to kiss her, he was breaking the unwritten rules.

“Chat?” Ladybug asked, pulling him from his thoughts.

He shook his head to clear his mind and looked to her. He glanced at the problem on the page, took a moment to remember how to do it, and began his explanation.

For an hour, they worked on her homework. It took time, but she eventually got the hang of the problems and finished her work. He checked over her paper, and only a couple times did he find mistakes, which she was quick to fix. After her textbook and notebook had been put away, they chatted.

Adrien was surprised at how easily they had drifted back into their usual selves. He thought he had fucked everything up in asking her to help him by kissing him, for she had seemed so distraught afterwards. But she seemed fine now, and they were comfortably making conversation, talking about anything and everything.

His clothes were still in the dryer when she looked at her watch and announced that she had to go.

“Thank you for helping me with physics. I really appreciate it,” she said, sliding her arms into her coat.

Like always, he didn’t want to see her go. He was searching for any and every excuse to be with her, hear her voice, talk to her for just a moment longer. When he spotted his black umbrella, he knew exactly what he could do.

“Let me walk you home!” He exclaimed a bit too eagerly, bringing his hand up. He played it off by rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s still raining, and my clothes aren’t finished yet, so I still have a few minutes to spare.”

Much to his surprise, she said, “Okay.”

And so he held his black umbrella over the two of them as they walked down the street. He tried to ignore the returning butterflies. He tried not to think about the fact that he was about to learn where she lived. She was chattering on about a design she was working on as the rain pattered around them. He was listening, but his mind was wandering.

It seemed like only half a minute had passed when they arrived at her apartment complex. They stepped inside to the lobby, and Adrien kept the door open to shake the excess water from his umbrella. He walked with her to the elevator and escorted her to the third floor. They stopped outside a door with a shiny, gold “3C” perched at the top.

“I would invite you in,” Ladybug said as she slid the key into the lock. “But I have to go meet my friend at a restaurant. We’re supposed to have dinner together to celebrate some milestones she’s reached with her blog.”

“Your friend has a blog?” He asked. This time, Adrien wasn’t trying to stall and spend just a few more moments with her (though it was certainly a plus). He was merely curious. He remembered she described her best friend as a writer once, but he didn’t know that she had a blog.

Ladybug nodded. “Yeah, it’s called the Ladyblog. It’s all about female empowerment, discussing issues that plague young girls and offering insight about certain topics. It can be really helpful to teenagers and adults. Last week, she released an article about significant others who cheat. It gave advice on how to handle cheaters, and it gave a sense of validation to those who have been cheated on, reminding them that they weren’t the problem and that they weren’t obligated to forgive.”

“That sounds really cool,” Adrien said. He was genuine in saying this. While he was a privileged male and he wasn’t commonly exposed to issues of society, especially with women, he saw a new world when he started attending university. Women like Maeva taught him some of the problems they struggled with.

“Yeah, her article got a lot of hits and was shared on social media. A lot of women and even some men were affected by it, and they commented their thanks. She gained more readers and comments on her other articles. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so happy. She’s so excited to be spreading awareness about sex education and body positivity and all that. She tends to hit some difficult topics, but she finds that her hard work is worth it if it means she can help even one person,” Ladybug said.

“Where does she find the inspiration?” He asked.

“For her blog, she was inspired by situations she had seen on social media and in real life, like older guys cat-calling prepubescent girls and the inequality of the sexes in many industries. As for the articles, she writes about things she wishes someone would’ve told her when she was a teenager, things she’s experiences, and experiences people have shared with her. The article about cheating… well, I inspired that one,” she told him. She lowered her head and brought her hands up to play with the edge of her scarf, and he could tell that she was thinking of bad memories.

“I’m sorry you had to go through that. Whoever he is, he’s an idiot. You’re amazing,” he said, tapping his umbrella on the floor.

She lifted her gaze, and he could see those memories being shoved away. “T-Thanks,” she said. She stopped pulling at her scarf and looked to the door. “I should really go. She’ll kill me if I’m late.”

“Oh, of course,” he said, realizing that he had delayed her. He scratched at the skin behind his ear. “I’m sorry I kept you standing here. I’d love to hear more about your friend’s blog sometime. I’ll go, now, though. See you next week?”

“Yes, I’ll see you next week,” she smiled.

Adrien smiled back and gave her a weak wave before shuffling down the hall. As he made his way to the elevator, he could hear a door open behind him. He stepped into the elevator and turned, facing the hall. She was still standing there, and she was looking to him.

Ladybug held her hand up and waved as the elevator doors slid together.

He stumbled back into the wall. She was _definitely_ going to be the death of him.

 

***

 

The next time he saw her, she had a gift for him. It was packaged in a box with blue wrapping and tied with a pink bow. Rather than giving it to him directly, it sat on top of the washer he always used. A tag was attached at the top, and _Chat_ was written in swirly cursive.

She watched him closely as he lifted the box. He raised an eyebrow, glancing up at her, and she motioned for him to go on. Adrien carefully tore the wrapping paper away and opened the box to find a blue scarf. He ran his fingers along the soft, bright fabric. When he picked it up and turned it in his hands, he discovered that it was similar to the scarf Ladybug had worn the week prior.

“Do you like it?” She asked. As she waited for his reply, she bit her lip.

He shook his head mutely, and her face fell. “I love it,” he said. He didn’t care if he was being cliché. He looked to her and asked, “Did you make this?”

She nodded, a bashful smile appearing on her face.

He moved closer to her to place his hands on her shoulders. The vibrant blue scarf was still in his grip. “I love it,” he repeated. “Thank you.”

As he retracted his hands, she took the scarf from him and wound it around his neck. “Now all you need is a warmer coat and you’ll be set for the cold season,” she said. He chuckled, and she continued, “This is just something to say thank you for helping me with that physics work. I got perfect marks on the exam.”

“That’s awesome!” Adrien exclaimed. He had to suppress the urge to pick her up and spin her as they did in the films. It was only a test she had passed, but his mind wanted to do anything to get close to her.

She opened her mouth, but she was hesitant to speak again. “I was thinking we could go get coffee to celebrate?”

Adrien smiled. “That sounds perfect.”

Together, the two made their way down the block. The sun was still blocked by clouds, but the afternoon rain had stopped not long ago. The smell of raindrops on pavement still filled the air, along with humidity and the bitter wind. Adrien felt much warmer with his scarf around his neck and his lady at his side.

Their hands grazed as they walked, and neither of them pulled away. Eventually, as they discussed the upcoming release of a new video game and Adrien tried to ignore the erratic beating of his heart, their pinkies hooked together and remained intertwined until they arrived at the café.

“I bet I could totally wreck you at Ultimate Mega Strike Five,” Adrien said, settling into his seat.

Ladybug rolled her eyes playfully. “Oh, please. I’ll be handing you your ass on a golden platter, and you won’t even be able to complain because you’ll be too busy bowing down to the queen.”

His jaw dropped, the corners of his lips twitching into a grin. “Damn, Bugaboo. That’s savage.”

“I don’t mess around when it comes to Ultimate Mega Strike,” she said. “I doubt the new one will be half as good as any of the first three, though. UMS Four wasn’t all that great.”

Before their conversation furthered, a waiter came by and took their orders. Adrien and Ladybug handed in their menus, and Adrien leaned forward on his elbows.

“Which one is your favorite?” He asked.

She didn’t even take a moment to think before she replied, “Ultimate Mega Strike 3 is the best there is. I remember playing the original game with my dad, though, and that one is a close second. But the bots and the bosses of the third are so badass.”

“I didn’t begin playing UMS until the third one was released, so I never played the first two,” Adrien admitted.

“I still have them,” Ladybug said, peering at him with her starry blue eyes. “Maybe one day we can have a game night? I’ll even promise to give you a fighting chance.”

“That sounds perfect! I don’t even care if you kick my ass. In fact, it’d be an honor to have my ass kicked by you, my lady,” he laughed.

Ladybug smirked, and his attention was drawn to those soft, pink lips of hers. Oh, how he wanted to kiss her again. Would he ever have the opportunity to do so again? Things did seem to be going well, but he did tend to mess things up very quickly. Only time would tell, he supposed. He really hoped that time would be kind.

“Oh, trust me, the pleasure would be all mine,” she said. His eyes widened at her words, and his face turned scarlet. It was such an innocent statement, yet his mind went straight into the gutter and he wanted to hit himself in the face. He wasn’t a teenage boy anymore. He had some self-control.

Finally realizing what her words may have implied, Ladybug flushed. Both of them scrambled to say something, move on to the next topic, _anything_ , but the words died on their tongues. Thankfully, a distraction came in the form of their orders being delivered to the table.

Adrien mumbled his thanks to the waiter and immediately took a drink of his coffee, ignoring how the heat burned his tongue and throat as it went down.

_Went down._

Okay, his mind was definitely too far in the gutter and he needed to get ahold of himself.

“Are there any other games you enjoy?” Ladybug asked. Finally, his thoughts were dragged from the dirty, dirty corner and he was brought back to reality.

“Well, I don’t have much time for games anymore, but when I was a teen, I enjoyed arcade games. Pacman and Dance Dance Revolution were two of my favorites. I would sit in my room and play them for hours,” Adrien told her.

Ladybug, who had been bringing her coffee mug to her lips, paused. “You mean you had the PC and console versions of those games?”

Adrien shook his head. “No, I had the arcade machines.”

She blinked twice. “You had arcade machines… in your room?”

“I also had a rock-climbing wall and an elaborate computer set-up with several different monitors,” he said. Realizing that he had been unconsciously flaunting his wealth, he smiled nervously.

“That is too fucking cool,” she whispered, awe-struck. She set her mug on the table and leaned forward. “Tell me more about your childhood home.”

“Okay,” he agreed. “But only if you do the same.”

“It’s a deal.”

For the next half-hour, they took turns describing the rooms they grew up in and the places they once called home. Awkward moments were long forgotten, and when they walked back to the laundromat, still chatting, their pinkies were linked once again.

 

***

 

“But Nino, I’m telling you, I’m in love with her!” Adrien insisted.

He was sitting in his best friend’s desk chair, spinning in circles as the other man rustled through his closet. He had stopped in after history class to gush about a certain

When he declared his love for Ladybug, Nino simply laughed.

“You can’t be in love with her. You don’t even know her name,” Nino said, rolling up the sleeves of a black button-up. He reached for the red cap on his desk but paused with his arm in mid-air. He pulled his arm back, looked off into the distance, and furrowed his eyebrows. “I feel as if we’ve had this conversation before.”

“You said the same thing two months ago,” Adrien pointed out. “But things have changed since then. I know her. I know she’s caring and encouraging and helpful and compassionate and dedicated. I know that she has a tendency to be late, and she struggles with physics. I know she loves the people in her life with all her heart. I know her, Nino, and I know I love her.”

“The fact that she still hasn’t told you her name makes me think she’s hiding something,” his friend said. He reached for his hat once again and put it on. He slid into a pair of black sneakers and turned in front of the mirror, checking his outfit. He looked to Adrien. “Does this look okay? I’m taking Alya to dinner at that new restaurant that opened up on fifth street.”

Adrien considered him for a moment. “That new restaurant is pretty fancy, so lose the hat and add a tie,” he concluded. As Nino followed his advice and began his search for a tie, Adrien continued, “I don’t think she’s hiding something. I think she just likes the mystery. Or maybe she’s scared. She does know that I’m old friends with Chloé Bourgeois. That’s pretty intimidating.”

“Oh, God, she’s probably terrified. Half of Paris has a bad past with Chloé. Perhaps she’s part of that half,” Nino said. “You know, I went to school with Chloé. I can definitely include _myself_ in that half. How you are friends with her is beyond me.”

Something about his words made Adrien think back to the party at the club. Though confused by his sudden forwardness, Ladybug hadn’t seemed nervous until he mentioned Chloé. Maybe she hadn’t been scared off by the kiss but by Chloé!

As Adrien got lost in his thoughts, someone knocked on the door. The blond was pulled from his head. He noticed that Nino was still wrestling with his tie, so he got up to answer the door.

“Hey, Adrien,” Alya said, smiling at him. She was looking radiant in a white blouse, yellow pencil skirt, and black kitten-heels, and Nino was quick to acknowledge this.

“You look stunning,” the dark-haired male said. He made Adrien step aside so he could take his girlfriend by the waist and place a kiss against her lips.

Adrien sighed. He wished he could have that.

“You could, if you’d let me set you up with my friend. She’s cute and single and perfect for you,” Alya said in a sing-song voice. He hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

Nino smirked, glancing at his friend. “His heart has already been stolen by some girl he met at the laundromat,” he said. He looked back to his girlfriend. “Get this… He’s been talking to her for two months, he still doesn’t know her name, and he insists he’s in love with her.”

A strange look passed over Alya’s face, and she eyed Adrien. “Hmm…” she said, obviously contemplating something.

Assuming it was nothing, Adrien rolled his eyes at his best friend’s teasing. “Laugh all you want, but one day, you’re going to meet her and you’ll understand,” he said. He grabbed his coat from the bed and tied his blue scarf around his neck before heading back towards the door. “I’ll see you in class tomorrow, Nino. It was nice seeing you, Alya. Have a nice dinner.”

The couple said their goodbyes, and Adrien strolled down the hall, ready to head to his next class.

Back in the tiny dorm room, Alya narrowed her eyes at her boyfriend. “In love with a girl he met two months ago at a laundromat? And he doesn’t know her name?”

“I know. Crazy, isn’t it?” Nino said. He sighed, taking a seat on his bed. The mattress shifted with his weight. “I keep telling him that the girl is probably insane or hiding some deep secrets.”

“Whether or not she’s insane is debatable, but she’s not some axe murderer or anything,” she said. Nino raised an eyebrow, and she answered his unspoken question. “It’s Marinette, the girl he’s in love with.”

“How do you know?”  

“Mari won’t stop talking about Chat Noir, the green-eyed, blond-haired man she met at the laundromat two months ago. She’s never caught his name, but through conversation, she’s learned a lot about him. She knows that he attends university, that he’s a physics major, that he met his best friend at a fencing competition,” Alya told him. She took a seat next to him. “And last week, she made that blue scarf he was wearing.”

Nino’s eyes widened. Had he really been that blind? It made so much sense! Everything Adrien told him about Ladybug perfectly described Marinette, from the raven hair and blue eyes and freckles to the notorious tardiness to the dedicated heart. His two best friends were in love with each other!

“Wait, what are we going to do?” He asked, gazing at his girlfriend.

Alya shrugged. “I say we leave it alone for now. They’re adults, and they’ll sort it out for themselves. Plus, I don’t want to be the one to tell Marinette that the man she flirts with every week is the son of her fashion idol.”

Nino could only imagine that scene. He thought it’d be full of wide eyes and squeals and disbelief. Laughing to himself, he wrapped his arm around Alya’s waist and pulled her closer. “You’re right, as always. They’re adults, and we don’t have to baby them. We don’t even have to worry about it, especially not right now. Tonight is a night for just the two of us.”

“Just the two of us,” Alya smirked, leaning into him. Her lips brushed over his. “I like the sound of that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ta da!  
> these dorks are too cute
> 
> also, updates are probably gonna be kinda slow  
> I've never been very busy during the summer, but there's a lot going on for me right now  
> for one, I came out to my friends. I no longer have to hide who I am, and it's so freeing. I'm a lot more comfortable around them, so we've been hanging out more. and this is our last summer with one of our friends before he goes off to the military. we're making memories and enjoying the time we have left with him and with each other before we all go off to college and part ways.  
> and I got a job, so that's a thing  
> writing time is a very, very rare thing to get.  
> therefore, slow updates.  
> I do apologize, but time is such a precious thing right now and everything is changing  
> thank you all for understanding.
> 
> as always, thanks for reading <3
> 
> -Cat =^.^=


	4. iv. December

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> slight trigger warning this chapter  
> Marinette struggles with some self-hate and intrusive thoughts, so just a forewarning about that

_Dear Mademoiselle Dupain-Cheng,_

_We regret to inform you that your submission for the annual Agreste Young Designers’ Contest has been rejected. We thank you for your hard work and determination in this project. However, your work is not what we are searching for. We hope you continue to practice, and we look forward to seeing your improvement in the next contest._

_Agreste & Co._

 

Marinette’s face fell as she read the words no designer wanted to see.

She had worked so hard. She had pulled two all-nighters and ignored her physics homework to perfect those designs, only to be rejected. She thought she had done well, but she was wrong.

 _If you were so confident in your performance_ , her conscience snarled, _then why didn't you tell anyone?_

Marinette dropped the paper and it floated slowly to the floor.

Why _hadn't_ she told anyone?

She knew why. She was afraid. She was afraid of failing, of being embarrassed, of getting those puppy-dog eyes of pity. She was afraid of not being good enough and of becoming a laughing stock. So many people gushed that she was such a talented young designer. They told her that with her work ethic, her dedication, and her passion, she was going to go far.

 _Oh, yeah. You made it so far_ , her mind scoffed. _You knew you weren't good enough._

She knew those designs weren't good enough. She wished she could blame it on a lack of inspiration or on school and other distractions, but at the end of the day, she knew that the real blame lied within herself. She just wasn’t good enough.

She choked on her thoughts and cried out, falling to the ground. She clutched the doorframe for some sort of support in a vain attempt to hold herself up, but her knees buckled and she sank to the floor. The tears began to flow, and she was ashamed. Disgust burned in her heart. How dare she cry over something so trivial. She was a grown-ass woman; she shouldn’t have been wasting her tears over something she could’ve prevented.

But there she sat, crying on the floor for half an hour until the back of her throat was numb and her eyes were as puffy as her father’s pastries. For the following ten minutes, she sat in silence, unable to think or speak or feel. Her mascara tracks had been completely washed away by the never-ending tears.

A chime from her phone finally pulled her from her trance.

Marinette sniffled and wiped her cheeks with the sleeve of her sweater. Her knees were still shay, but she was able to stand. She picked up the letter, folded it, and placed it back into the envelope. She tossed it into the trash bin next to her bed before picking up her phone.

**From: Alya**

_Please don’t forget to buy milk, eggs, and flour on your way home from meeting your boy <3 _

_I’m making dinner for the two of us after class_

She sniffled again and began to slide her phone in her pocket. Furrowing her eyebrows, she paused and looked at the screen once last time. 3:47. So, she was going to be late. Again.

 _Today just isn’t my day_ , she thought. Sighing, she shuffled through her apartment and collected the dirty laundry.

Her eyes were still swollen when she left her home ten minutes later.

The laundromat was more crowded than usual that Thursday. The section of washers and dryers she frequented was overrun by a group of middle-aged women who were chatting and gossiping as they sorted through laundry. They glanced to Marinette as she passed, looks of pity flashing on their features. Marinette turned away from them and retreated to the other side of the room. She felt eyes follow her every step. Chat was nowhere to be seen.

_They know I failed._

Marinette winced and chided herself for being so paranoid. No one could simply look at her and know that she had been rejected. The only thing that was catching attention was her red eyes and flushed cheeks.

She decided to occupy a washer at the end of the row, isolated with her backs to the others. Her body turned on auto-pilot and began going through the motions of washing, while her mind went into over-drive. She thought back on the designs she submitted. She could admit that they weren’t particularly inspired. They weren’t her best creatively, but she had showed off her technical skills. The construction of her cloche hat and the design of her dress were practically perfect; she had made sure of it (by re-doing the parts she messed up. She had to scrap a lot of fabric, but at least she had experimental swatches for upcoming projects).

But what if she had messed up? What if her stitching was loose and the dress fell apart when Gabriel Agreste examined it? Had Gabriel Agreste even seen it? Usually, in the big contests, designs went through qualifications with his employees. If they were approved by employees, his design assistant would review them. Only the exceptional designs were actually seen by the fashion connoisseur. At least, that’s what Alice had told her. Alice, her design teaching-assistant who interned with one of the top designers in Paris, had apparently learned that from someone who had once worked for Gabriel.

She didn’t know if she should be horrified or glad. If the design was truly as atrocious as her mind wanted to think, then she supposed it was lucky that Gabriel himself didn’t see it. She’d never be given a chance in the fashion business if he judged such a monstrosity! Her career would be over before it ever began.

“Wow, it’s crowded today, huh, Princess?” A man asked behind her. The sudden approach of the voice startled her, and she jumped. She turned quickly to face the person who caused her such a start. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to scare…“ Chat blinked, a frown forming at the sight of her.

Marinette wanted to hide her face in her hands, but she knew the damage had already been done. It was too obvious she had been crying. Perhaps she should’ve tried to conceal the red with makeup before she left her apartment. Her mind had just been too far away.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Chat asked, his eyes filling with pity. No, that wasn’t pity, she decided. This was a combination of concern and empathy.

Marinette shook her head mutely in response, and he didn’t push her any further. Instead of speaking, he stood at the machine beside her and began his own washing. She didn’t say a word, either, but her mind was finally quiet, too.

Once all of her clothes were in the machine and she pressed the start button, she took a step back and watched the colors swirl with the white suds. It was hypnotizing, that constant spin, but it lulled her into a peaceful state and helped her forget the pain and the self-doubt, if only for a while.

Chat placed his hand on her arm, and she tore her gaze from the washer. The spell was broken, and the memories came flooding back. The walls of the room seemed far too white and the lights seemed much too bright. A dull ache was beginning in the back of her head.

“Let’s go on an adventure,” he said.

She replied flatly, “It’s raining.”

“I have an umbrella, and we won’t be walking much, just out to a cab and into the place I want to go,” he assured her.

She took this, along with other factors, into consideration. She needed to be home by six o’clock in order to have the groceries for Alya’s dinner, and she was already pushing that time constraint due to her late start on the laundry. She still had to go to the store. She had no idea where Chat wanted to go, but it wasn’t close enough to walk, apparently.

But if she stayed, she would only succumb to the doubts in her mind and fall deeper into a hole. If she went, she could possibly enjoy Chat’s company and get her mind off that rejection. With his cheerful behavior, it was difficult to feel sad around Chat. And perhaps getting out is exactly what she needed… If she was stuck staring at white walls for an hour and a half, she was going to die.

“Okay,” she decided. “Lead the way.”

She didn’t have to gather her things or pick up her jacket. In her dazed state, she had failed to grab anything but her laundry, her purse, and her jacket, and she never removed the latter two. Chat reached for his umbrella and his scarf—he was wearing the scarf she made him, she noted. It made her feel a bit better. At least her designs had been good enough for _someone_ —and escorted her out the door. His black umbrella was lifted above her the moment they stepped into the rain, and she was sheltered from the cold drops. It took them a few minutes to hail a cab, but eventually, they ducked into the back of a black car.

Marinette stared at the window, slave to empty thoughts and inattentive as Chat gave his directions to the driver. She studied the life of Paris around them. The streets were as busy as they usually were, if not more, despite the rain. People were probably tired of staying in, she pondered. The cold often gave people an excuse to bask in the warmth of their homes rather than run errands or wander the streets, but when isolated for weeks at a time, people got restless.

The sky was already darkening. Clouds hid any trace of the sun, but in the west, she could vaguely see the light fading. Nights in Paris could be beautiful. City lights shined, constant in the chancing world. But shorter days felt like time was being lost, and those dazzling city lights (along with the ever-present clouds) drowned out the stars. Some days, Marinette didn’t mind the night. In fact, there were times where she would sit on the roof with a mug of tea and enjoy the peace. Other days, however, night just seemed sad and dark.

She hadn’t decided how she felt about this dawning night.

Marinette now watched raindrops gather on the window, connecting to form bigger drops before sliding down and disappearing or being blown away by the breeze. The contrast of the cool air and the heat of the car had caused the glass to fog. She raised her finger to the glass, pressing the tip gently against it just to see a clear imprint left behind.

They may have been in the car for two minutes or twenty; Marinette was too lost in her mind to register time. What even was time? It seemed to be an abstract concept created by human beings. Though the sun always rose and set and the moon always took its orbit and the earth always orbited the sun, actual seconds and minutes and hours were a measurement.

She wondered if there was a scale of measurement for failures.

“Bugaboo, we’re here,” Chat said, shaking her arm gently. She looked out her window, but she realized that he was pulling her the other way. She glanced to the other side to gaze at the building before them. It was a building of glass. A beautiful design, she noted, but she didn’t really know what it was until she stepped out.

“A greenhouse?” She questioned, peering at him under the umbrella. “Won’t it be closing soon?”

“I… I have certain… connections. I think they’ll allow us to stay a bit past closing time,” he told her.

Without questioning this, she followed him inside. They had to pay for tickets, and when she unzipped her purse, he waved her hand away. She had bought his coffee a few weeks prior, and he had never repaid her for the scarf, so he insisted he pay the measly sum for the tickets. She didn’t have it in her to argue.

Chat took her hand. “This way,” he said, tugging her towards a corridor.

Marinette felt the heat and the dry air before she saw a single plant. Finally, the towering cacti and other succulent plants came into view. There were no other people around, so she was free to roam and view the growing life.

“Hey, Bug?” Chat called out as she studied green leaves and dry soil. She swiveled around and looked at him expectantly. He pointed to one of the small plants. “What did one aloe say to the other? Aloe you vera much! Get it? I love you very much?”

She shot him a flat look, but that didn’t wipe the toothy grin from his face.

“What did the aloe say to the cactus?” He asked, taking a step closer to her. She winced, preparing herself for the lame punchline to follow. “Looking sharp!”

“You are completely insufferable,” she groaned, twirling back around to resume her study. She ran her fingers gently along a cactus in an attempt to feel its needles.

“What are you talking about? My puns are succulent!” He said, now standing directly beside her.

Marinette shook her head at him. “I ought to throw you into this bed of cacti,” she threatened.

He made a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat; both of them knew she would never do that. She would never hurt him… unless he gave her actual reason to, that was.

The pair didn’t stay in the arid section of the greenhouse for very long. After five more minutes, all the plants seemed to look the same, and they didn’t have much of a scent. So, they moved on to the next exhibit.

The tropical rainforest section was humid and hot, but Marinette didn’t pay attention to that. Instead, she felt as if she were drowning in a sea of green. The color was everywhere. Thick, green foliage spiraled towards the ceiling and danced over their heads. She reached out to graze the waxy surface of a giant leaf. Every so often, she saw a vibrant flower or an exotic little bug. In her mind, she imagined colorful macaw parrots flying above and red-eyed tree frogs jumping from plant to plant. She could even hear the symphony of the different organisms that lived in harmony.

Marinette observed the sign that gave examples of all the animals that could be found in tropical rainforests. It had a picture of a yawning ocelot. Smirking, she tugged on the sleeve of Chat’s shirt to get his attention. He turned to her, and she pointed to the cat. “That’s you!”

He chuckled and pointed to a photo of a toucan. “Are we playing I-spy? Well, _toucan_ play at that game.”

She rolled her eyes and sighed in exasperation.

Jokes were the only words spoken between them. Marinette still hadn’t offered any insight into why she had been crying, nor had she made any comments about the beautiful scenery. Chat never pushed her to speak. He seemed perfectly content to be in her company, and she was grateful for that.

The redness of her face had almost faded by the time they stepped into the next section. It was a greenhouse of beautiful common flowers. Rose bushes and lilies and geraniums beckoned to her, and alyssum and peonies smiled in greeting. A sweet scent filled the air, and peace had fully settled over her mind.

Chat pulled her towards the alyssum flowers. “Look! Don’t ladybugs love alyssum?”

She leaned down to sniff at the white petals, but as soon as she inhaled, she broke out into a fit of sneezes. She buried her face in her scarf

Chat frowned. “I suppose not all ladybugs love alyssum, then. I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were allergic.”

“I didn’t either,” Marinette giggled.

“You know cats enjoy chasing birds?” He asked. She raised her eyebrow at the seemingly-random question. “Well, I can’t be like a cat in that sense because I’m allergic to feathers. We’re both failing our namesakes because of allergies.”

“Really? I… I once made a bowler hat inspired by pigeons. It was for this contest, and it won. The designer’s son had to wear it, and it turns out that he was allergic to feathers as well. Must be a common allergy,” she said. She didn’t give it a second thought as she moved onto the next flower display, but Chat paused.

“What designer was holding the contest?” He asked. His eyebrows were drawn together, as if he were trying to recall a memory, but she didn’t question it.

“Gabriel Agreste,” she said. She hesitated before adding, “I entered his latest contest, too. The reward was a nice sum of money and chance to shadow him during Fashion Week. I was hoping to use that money to launch my own little business. Not a storefront or anything, just a website, but fabric and supplies are expensive, and I’ve really been getting a lot of propositions for commissions. So, I tried really hard and submitted a design, but it was rejected.”

“Gabriel Agreste is one tough critic,” Chat told her. “He’s also an old stiff who applauds tradition and condemns modernistic, flashy fashion. You were probably just too integrated for him, but that doesn’t mean you failed. It just means you didn’t please _his_ tastes. And fashion is about expressing yourself.”

Marinette, reaching to feel a rose petal, paused to look up at him. In that moment, in that light, he seemed oddly familiar, but she told herself it was just the three months of knowing each other. Of course he was familiar. She had seen him every Thursday for some twelve weeks or so.

“Aren’t you a wise cat,” she muttered. She turned her attention back to the flora in front of her. “It doesn’t matter. My design just wasn’t good enough. I’ll have to work harder if I want to make it anywhere in the fashion industry.”

“The fashion industry is a tough business, but I think you have the talent and dedication to go far,” Chat said.

As if she hadn’t heard that a million times.

When she didn’t reply, Chat took her hand. His fingers were warm against hers.

“They’ll be closing soon. We should go,” he said.

“I thought you said you have _connections_?” She pointed out.

The blond shrugged. “I wouldn’t want to inconvenience the workers. I’m sure they want to get home to their families,” he said, waving his other hand as if waving away her worries. He glanced at her and smiled. “Plus, I have somewhere else I’d like to go.”

“Where?”

“My apartment, if you’re comfortable with that. I want you to meet someone… or a couple someones.”

 

***

 

His apartment wasn’t at all what she expected.

Okay, to be honest, she hadn’t really had any expectations. Chat Noir seemed so mysterious, and she had a difficult time imagining him anywhere outside of the laundromat and café. Did he even exist on any other day of the week?

It was silly, she knew. Chat was still a human being. Of course he existed. Of course he went places. Of course he had a home. After all, where would his laundry be coming from?

It was clean. That was the first thing she noticed about his home.

Most young adults just living on their own lived in mess. Clothes strewn about, a pile of dishes sitting stationary in the sink, days-old milk growing lumpy in the fridge. With new freedom came new responsibility, and sometimes, it was difficult to fulfill all those responsibilities.

Chat seemed to have no trouble staying clean, but perhaps that was to be accounted to his minimalist lifestyle.

There wasn’t much in the apartment. The kitchen was practically spotless, and she guessed that all his dishes were put away in the cupboards. There weren’t any fancy fruit bowls or tiny knick-knacks in sight. In pristine condition it was. The dining area was a small table in the corner, one with only two chairs. A set of salt and pepper shakers was its only decoration, save for a neat stack of letters.

The living room was just as tidy. There wasn’t much in it. A couch, a coffee table, and a TV stand with a small television were the only pieces of furniture. The place hardly looked lived in; if she had just wandered in, she would’ve believed it to be abandoned.

But it wasn’t cold. Cold and bare were two very different things in Marinette’s eyes. Bare was just the potential for. Cold was the absence of. Chat’s apartment had potential, potential to be filled with warmth and light and life. Marinette hoped it would fulfill that potential; she couldn't imagine Chat living in a cold home, not after living in his childhood home. He hadn’t said much of the place he grew up, but she could see the loneliness in his eyes when he did open up about it.

While Marinette was busy looking around, Chat stepped into the bedroom. It was a small room that lay just beyond an old wooden door. The paint of the white frame was chipping, Marinette would notice later. In fact, the paint on the walls and other furniture was chipping as well. The apartment was a bit of a fixer-upper, but that only added to its potential.

He returned with a box.

Marinette craned her neck, trying to see inside the cardboard cube, but he held it too close to his chest, out of her sight range.

Chat told her to take a seat, and so she did. The couch was brand new, forged from sturdy wood and orange fabric and too-firm cushioning.

He sat beside her, and she finally had the chance to peer into the box.

“Meet Plagg and Tikki,” Chat said, lifting a black kitten and a grey kitten from the box.

Blue eyes grew wider than the vast heavens, and Marinette reached out to touch one. The back of her thin, dainty fingers brushed against soft tufts of fur.

“Do you want to hold one?” He asked. She nodded silently. She didn't hold the same excitement as a kid; her lips didn't curl into a toothy grin, her heartbeat didn't go rogue, and her eyes had returned to their normal size. No, she was completely calm as he handed her the grey kitten. It fit in the palm of her hand. “That's Tikki.”

She didn't even question their names. For reasons unknown, the names just seemed to fit.

She briefly wondered where he had gotten them.  

Though she didn't voice her questions, he launched into story mode. “I was walking home from the laundromat last week and I heard these tiny mews from the side of the street. No one around me seemed to hear them, so I thought the rain was messing with my mind. But then, I looked down, and there were seven little kittens in a box,” he said.

She interrupted to ask a question. “Seven?”

He continued, “Four of them, I was able to give away to friends. The fifth one didn't make it to Saturday. He was the smallest of the litter, and I guess the rain didn't help him. These two are the last ones I have, but I'm only allowed to keep one, so I have to find a new home for Tikki.”

Marinette glanced to the grey kitten she held. It-- Tikki-- snuggled against her, and blue eyes peered up at her. The baby animal was so very thin, all bone under the layer of fluff. With care, she’d be as happy and healthy as ever. Tikki blinked a few times before closing her eyes, her purr vibrating Marinette’s skin.

“I'll take her,” she stated.

Chat smiled, his childlike innocence showing through in the white gleam of his teeth. “I think she'll be very happy with you, Buginette.”

The corners of her lips curved up in an impossibly tiny smile. It wasn't much, but even the smallest of victories were worth celebrating.

Marinette glanced around the room again, and something new caught her attention. Displayed on a shelf was a jar of coins. There wasn't a label to distinguish its purpose. Her curiosity pushed her to point to it and ask, “What are you saving up for?”

Chat shrugged. “I'm not sure yet,” he said. Her eyebrows knitted together in confusion, and he went on to explain, “In films and shows, characters always have a jar of spare change for road trips or concerts or vacations. I figured I could find some use for it eventually. Maybe I'll buy a motorcycle. Maybe I'll donate it to charity. It’s a jar of money and potential.”

She stared at him.

Marinette thought back to her conversation with Alya, the conversation in which she first told her about Chat. Alya had questioned if such a man could be cute, smart, and innocent. It was an impossible combination, and it didn’t quite describe her Chat. No, he was so much _more_.

Every day she saw him, every moment she spent with him, he seemed reveal a new side of himself. He wasn’t just cute and smart and innocent. He was sensitive, empathetic, and wise. He harbored so much hope in his warm heart. He was mesmerizing to Marinette.

She wanted to know him better. She wanted to drink him in and learn his biggest fears, hear of his favorite pieces of art, and find what inspired him. She wanted to know everything that crawled in his mind, whether it was dark or light or completely irrelevant. She wanted to know him.

She wanted him to know her.

She wanted to spill her darkest secrets and babble on about her passions to him. She wanted to share the things she had never told anyone. She wanted him to kiss her, to touch her, to memorize how her body feels under his hands as they...

Okay, maybe she was getting ahead of herself.

She definitely didn’t need to be thinking about him like that, especially when he was sitting right beside her and he was looking at her and he was leaning in…

Oh, he was leaning in.

She could feel his breath on her skin, and she could see his eyes wide. Oddly enough, it didn’t seem like he had moved at all…

Because he hadn’t, Marinette realized. She was the one who had moved; she was the one leaning in. Tikki and Plagg were abandoned on the floor, oblivious to the two adults.

The rational side of her brain told her to stop what she was doing and back away, but the other, more rash side of her brain was louder and telling her to continue. She listened to the rash side.

“Can I kiss you?” She asked.

He nodded his head ever-so-slightly. “Please do.”

She pressed her lips to his, and for the second time, they kissed. It was nearly as soft as their first one, but their lips were slightly chapped from their time in the cold.

This kiss didn’t last as long as the first.

It was over moments after it began, but they were both breathless when they pulled away.

Marinette looked at Chat, and he looked back at her. Wordlessly, he placed his hands on the back of her neck and pulled her back to him. His thumbs brushed against her cheeks as his lips met hers again. She tangled her fingers in his hair and kissed him back.

Almost instantly, she felt his tongue swirl against hers, and she tightened her grip on his hair. This kiss was more heated than either of their previous two, and she was melting in his arms. The world seemed to fade when she was kissing him. She couldn’t remember what had made her so sad. She couldn’t remember that she should’ve been going home to Alya. She couldn’t even remember that she still had laundry waiting to be finished at the laundromat.

All she could think about was how she wanted to get closer to him, to straddle his legs or to be trapped underneath him.

She wanted to always remember the feeling of his hands cupping her neck, his hands riding up her shirt to feel the soft skin of her stomach, his hands touching the tiny bow on her bra.

She wanted to know his name, his real name so she could whisper it.

 

***

 

She no longer wanted to know his name.

In fact, she regretted ever having wanted to know his name. Ignorance was bliss, and she wanted to return to heaven. She couldn't handle knowing who Chat truly was. She couldn't handle knowing that the man she had been talking to and flirting with, the man who flirted back, the man who kissed her was Adrien Agreste.

Finding out his name had been an accident, one that completely blindsided her.

She had been flipping through the latest edition of her favorite fashion magazine, trying to find a spark of inspiration for even a warm-up sketch. It had been a week since she made out with him on his couch. It didn’t progress much further than tentative hands caressing the silky material of her bra and lips exploring the skin of necks and shoulders and ears. The clothes had stayed on, and she was glad. She didn’t want her first time with him to be when she was feeling so down. She wanted it to be because they were both in their right minds and fully committing.

Not that she regretted kissing him. She did not regret kissing him. She did not regret the kissing, the touching, or nibbling on the soft skin of his earlobe (thus causing him to shiver and almost moan).

She didn’t even regret being late to dinner that night.

By the time she rolled into her apartment at eight thirty, Alya had made dinner, eaten, and cleaned up. The sassy reporter said she had ought to save the dishes for Marinette to do, but at least Marinette had sent her a text to let her know she would be late. Plus, Alya took one look at her beaming face and asked her to spill. Naturally, Marinette told her everything.

Marinette knew that they weren’t in a relationship, though, not legitimately. Neither of them had asked each other on a real date, nor had they discussed being exclusive. As far as she knew, it was just casual kissing. She thought that maybe they’d talk about it when they met again at the laundromat.

But that was before she saw it.

It was an ad for Dior. The sleek, black-and-white look was something Marinette would normally glance over briefly before turning to the next page. For a moment, that’s exactly what she did, but she thought she had recognized the model and she found herself turning back.

She knew exactly who the model was.

Clad in a dark suit, Chat was posing for the camera. His blond hair was tousled and sexy. He had one hand on the opposite arm, and his other hand was pressed to the lips that had once pressed against hers. It was typical for Dior. A man in a suit, elegant and refined, a perfectly sculpted face that made all the women hot and all the men jealous. His eyes screamed sophistication.

It would’ve been fine had his name not been branded at the bottom of the page.

_Adrien Agreste._

Marinette squealed and ended up tossing the magazine onto the coffee table, only to pick it up and do the same thing again. She repeated this action three times before she finally launched herself from the couch and moved to her room, where she paced back and forth.

It couldn’t be. Surely, Marinette would’ve known that the man she had been talking to for the past months was her childhood crush. She remembered tacking his ads onto her wall and creating a collage as her computer wallpaper. Other girls obsessed over pop stars and actors, but Marinette had her fashion model. Son of one of her favorite designers, Adrien Agreste had been a boy she kept her eyes on. His chubby cheeks and long, golden hair made her swoon when she was a teenager. And he was her age!

Oh, she used to spend her classes daydreaming about what it’d be like to date him and hold his hand and kiss him. She may have even named their potential future kids…

The crush began to fade when she dated Nathanael. She had a real boy who liked her and wanted to be with her, and she finally realized that Adrien was only a fantasy. She had never met him, and she probably never would. So, the photos came off the wall, the wallpaper was replaced with a photo she took at a Jagged Stone concert, and she moved on, only briefly glancing over the ads she saw featuring him.

When he reached eighteen, he showed up in less photoshoots and interviews. He stopped modelling for Gabriel in the past June. The press had a field day with that, but Marinette didn’t like when tabloids delved into personal lives of celebrities. It was difficult to discern what was actually fact and what had been fabricated, so she didn’t pay much attention to it.

How had she not recognized him, though?

He did seem familiar to her at first, but she was so shocked by the fact that a really cute guy was talking to her that she didn’t think to do her research. Plus, it wasn’t like there was an international database for cute guys. She didn’t even know his name, so what was she supposed to do, search “attractive French man with blond hair, green eyes, and a smile that lights up all of Paris” online?

But Adrien Agreste.

Of all people he could be, it was Adrien Agreste.

He had kissed her. She had kissed him. They made out on his couch. She cheered him up when he was sad, and two months later he did the same for her. They made out on his couch. He gave her a kitten. She flirted with him every Thursday for nearly four months. They made out on his couch!

Mon dieu, he had seen her ladybug-printed underwear!

She was right to be so nervous at the Halloween party. Being a friend of Chloe Bourgeois, she knew, meant that he had to be of high status. This fact, combined with the fact that he was at an exclusive party, revealed to Marinette that he was very elite, she just didn’t realize he was on the same plane as Gabriel Agreste. Because _he_ was an Agreste. She had openly mourned about losing his father’s design competition. That also meant that he had once worn the bowler had she designed.

She…

But…

Her brain was going to explode.

Tikki meowed at her in question. _Are you okay?_

No, she was decidedly _not_ okay.

Marinette’s body came to a halt, and she lifted her palms to her cheeks. He was Adrien Agreste, a model with friends in high places and a father who could crush her with a single look… or a single letter. She was just Marinette Dupain-Cheng, daughter of a baker and an aspiring designer with an unsure future.

There’s no way he’d want to be with her if he knew who she really was. He probably wouldn’t even want to be her friend.

She couldn’t ever face him again.

So, she skipped going to the laundromat that Thursday. And the next Thursday. Eventually, she was swept into the hustle and bustle of the holidays, but not even the cheerful jingles and soft falling snow and twinkling lights could distract her from the blond that haunted her thoughts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi, so it's been a month and I am so sorry  
> and this note is gonna be lengthy just so you know
> 
> first, I just want to say something to you  
> you are beautiful, you are not a failure, and you are worth so, so much.  
> everyone at one point struggles with thoughts like those Marinette was having in this chapter, but please, please don't let those thoughts become the ones you listen to.  
> life is difficult sometimes, but I promise that there will be good times.  
> working hard for what you want, or even basic existence isn't easy, but just because you're rejected or you mess up does not mean you're a failure.  
> you have so much potential. please do not give up. please try again.  
> if you all ever need to talk, come to me. send a message to my tumblr. or talk to a friend. or a teacher. someone you trust. anyone.  
> please.
> 
> two, some of you who read my other fic, Camp Miraculous, may have noticed that it's missing from my page.  
> there's an explanation, I swear.  
> it's a pretty long explanation that I shared on tumblr if you wanna read: http://tonguetiedcat.tumblr.com/post/148347058112
> 
> three, I'm sorry it took so long for me to get this out.  
> this past month has been insane.  
> life used to be a lot more simple, but now I'm facing new responsibilities and new problems and I'm still struggling with some things  
> now, I'm starting my final year of school and I'm moving to a new home in a month and time is even more limited!
> 
> my birthday is this month, though, so yay! just eleven days away. I'm looking forward to a paint fight, board games, and red velvet cupcakes with my best friends.  
> I've never been one for celebrating my birthday, but my military friend insists on doing something, as this could be the last birthday he's with me.  
> but red velvet cupcakes have been a tradition for a while.  
> do any of you have special birthday traditions?


	5. v. January

While his first holiday on his own—living on his own, that was. He had spent plenty of holidays alone in his childhood home—was full of cheer (thanks to Nino), a certain emptiness tugged at Adrien’s heart as December came to a close. There was no question as to why he felt this way; he missed a certain woman.

Ladybug was a constant in his life. Seeing her at the laundromat on Thursdays and having those random, impromptu adventures were a part of his routine. Making out with her in his apartment was a break in that routine, but he hadn’t minded at all. In fact, he wished that could be incorporated in his regular day-to-day life. The kissing, the touching, the talks. A real relationship, he wanted with her. He certainly wouldn’t have minded that.

Apparently she had minded, though.

She never came back to the laundromat after they said their goodbyes that Thursday.

The last image of her was burned into his brain. The sun had already set by the time they made it back to finish their laundry, so he had insisted on walking her home. The rain had been replaced by snow at one point, and the white ice crystals tangled with her dark hair. She had shivered when they stepped inside.

Adrien said goodbye to her at her door. She had set her laundry basket by the door, Tikki snuggled in the warm clothes at the top, and her keys jingled in her hand. Nearly all the snowflakes had melted into her hair. Even with the dim lighting of the hallway, she looked like an angel. He asked to kiss her once more. She obliged.

It was a soft kiss, not unlike their first. Their noses bumped as they pulled away, and he could feel how cold her skin was. Her lips held that just-kissed-senseless look.

“I’ll see you next Thursday?” He asked. _Please let me see you again_ , he wanted to say. _Please let me kiss you again._

Ladybug nodded, a smile tugging at the corner of those lips he would be dreaming of. “Next Thursday,” she confirmed.

She placed a gentle kiss to his cheek before opening her apartment door. Immediately, he heard a voice calling out a greeting to her. The voice sounded familiar, but he was all too busy watching Ladybug to dwell on it. She picked up the basket, gave him one last smile, and walked inside. Tikki mewed as the door closed.

He didn’t realize that their kiss goodbye would be their last.

The next week, Adrien waited patiently for her to show. It wasn’t too rare of an occurrence for her to be running behind schedule; he had soon learned that she was notorious for being tardy. He hadn’t thought twice when ten minutes passed. Then, ten minutes turned into twenty turned into two hours. His laundry had finished its cycles, and it was time for him to go home, but he lingered for an extra half hour.

She never showed.

Anxiety fluttered in his heart, though he tried to tell himself not to read into it too much. There were a million reasons as to why Ladybug may have not been able to make it. Perhaps she had a family emergency and had to go home, or maybe she had fallen asleep after pulling another all-nighter to finish a design. She could’ve even gotten the days mixed up. She had told him about how she once mistook a Tuesday for a Wednesday and attended the wrong class, so it could’ve happened.

When it happened the next Thursday, he panicked.

“She’s probably just busy with the holidays,” Nino had told him, trying to calm him down, but Adrien knew something was wrong. She had told him she would see him again. Those words held an unspoken promise, and she didn’t break her promises.

By the third Thursday she skipped on him, even Nino couldn’t deny that something was up. He questioned if anything had happened between the two of them that would give her a reason to avoid him.

Adrien didn’t think so, but the more he dwelled, the more insecure he became.

In the moment, Ladybug hadn’t protested to the kissing. _She_ had been the one to initiate it. But she had been upset. Less than an hour before, her eyes had been red and swollen from crying. She told him that she had lost his father’s design contest, and that was something that obviously meant a lot to her.

But what if she hadn’t wanted it? What if she had washed away her disappointment and come to realize that she didn’t care for him? He wouldn’t have been mad. If anything, he just hoped it didn’t seem like he was taking advantage of her. He would never have allowed it to progress any more than it had, and he would never do anything that she wasn’t consenting to. He wasn’t that person.

What if she hadn’t enjoyed kissing him? Perhaps she was just being kind in the moment, not wanting to hurt his feelings by letting him know she felt nothing or telling him he was a terrible kisser. It was a complaint he had never heard, though most kisses he had given were for photo shoots. He supposed that wasn’t a very good gauge for his kissing talent.

Part of him felt silly for being so insecure about whether or not he was a good kisser. Was he fifteen years old again?

This was all so new to him, and he hated the thought of messing it up in even the slightest way.

But it seems like he had messed it up, causing it to end before it really began.

January arrived in a blur. Adrien had attended a New Year's party, being invited by Chloe. He didn’t really know why he agreed to go; he didn’t know anyone there save for the blonde and her best friend. And all around him, he noticed, were couples.

He had felt trapped in the middle of them all as the countdown began. Voices rang out to welcome in the new year, and just as the final numbers were shouted, those couples began to lean in for a sweet kiss. The perfect way to start a new year, he thought, was to be one with someone you love.

He wished Ladybug would talk to him. He wished he could see her once more, just to find out what she was thinking. He just wanted to know why.

 

***

 

After weeks of watching their best friends mope, Alya and Nino decided it was time to step in.

It was obvious that the two young adults were hurting. Alya had tried to open Marinette’s eyes to the fact that she was being unfair, that she was causing someone else pain, but she was too deep in her own pity party to listen. Marinette refused to face her reality and own up to her mistakes, so Alya was going to show tough love and make her see Adrien again.

She and Nino had devised a plan. With Marinette back home for holiday break, it was the perfect time to stop in at the Tom & Sabine Boulangerie Patisserie. And what kind of best friend would Nino be if he didn’t insist his best friend come along to taste the best baked goods in Paris?

Convincing Adrien to come with them hadn’t been easy. He had argued that he’d be a third wheel, that he had already had far too many sweets from the holidays, that he just wanted to spend some time alone. Eventually, Nino lured him out with the promise of croissants.

Adrien buried his hands in his pockets and nestled into the warmth of his scarf. The winter wind was brittle, blowing snow into face and chilling him to the bone. Alya and Nino walked in front of him, the couple close together to bask in each other’s body heat. They laughed as they went along, leaning in every so often to bump shoulders. It was all cheerful smiles and loving glances. Adrien had to look away at the sickening, sweet sight.

He forced himself to swallow his loneliness.

He would overcome this. He would not tie his feelings to a girl who so carelessly threw his love away. He did not need her.

That’s what he told himself.

He would say and do anything to lessen the ache in his heart. Sometimes, the words were enough. Sometimes, a glass or two of wine helped.

Eventually, they stumbled upon the bakery they sought. Through the window, Adrien observed the quaint little shop. There were only a few customers inside, browsing the sweets and breads in the displays. A bulky man with a white apron and a burly mustache was putting out a fresh plate of croissants, and behind the register, a petite Chinese woman smiled and chatted to a paying customer.

The bell on the door chimed when they stepped inside, and both workers looked their way. Their smiles widened, and Adrien was immediately hit with a sense of home. He couldn’t place the exact source of this sense. Maybe it was their welcoming expression or the smell of baked goods or the heat, so vastly different from the icy chill that clothed his skin just moments before. Whatever it was, he was thankful. The tension in his shoulders that had bothering him for the past month faded just a bit.

“Alya! Nino! And Monsieur Agreste!” The woman exclaimed, finishing up the customer’s purchase. Adrien was slightly caught off guard, and it must have shown in his face, for she laughed. She stepped away from the counter and walked up to them. “Yes, I know who you are. Not only were your posters plastered on my daughter’s walls for the majority of her adolescence and teen years, Nino has told me a few things.”

Nino had mentioned the Dupain-Cheng daughter once, but her name he could not recall. All he knew is that she was Alya’s best friend, and she was probably around their age. Nino neglected to mention that she was a fan, and for this, Adrien shot him an icy glare.

The woman caught the look and laughed once again. “Don’t worry. She isn’t as obsessive as she used to be. I’m Sabine, by the way.”

Adrien smiled sheepishly and shook her hand. “Nice to meet you.”

“Speaking of Marinette,” Alya chimed in. Marinette. Yes, that was her name. Marinette Dupain-Cheng… It sounded awfully familiar, but Adrien brushed it off. “Where is she?”

“She’s upstairs working on a cake order, but she should be coming down any minute now,” Sabine said. “Feel free to pick out some sweets. It’s on the house, anything you want.”

Adrien looked to Alya and Nino, who didn’t protest. They didn’t even seem the tiniest bit phased, so he guessed that Madame Dupain-Cheng gave them free food often. His friends stepped away to peer into the displays, and Adrien pocketed his hands and busied himself with looking at the croissants. The man had moved to where Alya and Nino were at the tower of macarons and was now speaking to them, his hands gesturing wildly as he did so.

Soft footsteps caught Adrien’s attention, and he turned his head to see someone entering through a door behind the counter. The person’s face and chest was obstructed by a tall, white cake. She—Adrien presumed it was the daughter—took a few steps forward, and just as he was beginning to be impressed by her expert handling, she stumbled over some unseen force and started to fall forward.

Adrien moved quickly. He moved in front of the girl and held his arms to steady her before the beautiful cake was destroyed. The girl made a noise of surprise, and the man behind the counter scrambled over. He held his hands out to take the cake, and the two strangers turned to the side. Adrien finally got a look at the girl.

“Oh, thank y-” she began to say. Her voice gave out as she met his eyes.

Blue.

Her eyes just as blue as he remembered.

Before he could say, or even think, anything, Ladybug began to retreat towards the door through which she had appeared. The transfer of the cake hadn’t quite been complete, so the man dashed to get a steady grip on the platform.

“Marinette!” Sabine called out, just as the girl reached for the doorknob.

Ladybug—Marinette – paused. Her shoulders tensed, Adrien could see, and she turned slowly. She was wincing, and he could already discern the guilt in her features.

Was this happening?

Was this an illusion? It wouldn’t have been the first time his mind played tricks on him. On multiple occasions, he had thought he saw the same familiar black hair and blue eyes, a blur in the crowd of his life.

But this girl seemed so real. It had to be her.

“I’m sorry,” she said, casting her eyes to the floor.

Adrien didn’t know if she was apologizing to her mother, her friends, or him.

The room was tense for a moment. Alya and Nino looked between their friends expectantly, a fact to which both Adrien and Marinette caught on. The guilt shifted to disbelief and betrayal, and Marinette marched toward her friends.

“You guys knew, didn’t you? How long? Don’t tell me you guys figured it out before I did,” Marinette said. When she was met with silence, she scoffed. “And you didn’t tell me?!”

“It wasn’t our place to, Marinette. It’s your life. It was your relationship. You said you liked the mystery,” Alya said slowly.

Marinette crossed her arms over her chest defensively. “Oh, so it wasn’t your place to tell me that, but it is your place to bring him here? You know how bad I feel about all this. So much for not getting involved.”

Alya did not react pleasantly to this outburst. She took a step forward, her tone stern when she spoke. “It _is_ my place now because two people I care about are hurting, and that’s on you! You’re being childish, Marinette! You can’t just run away from your problems because you’re scared. You have to grow up.”

Calm and angry words turned into a shouting match between the two, one that was quickly ended by Marinette’s mother.

“Enough!” Sabine shouted, capturing everyone’s attention. All young adults paused, and the man busied himself with wiping down the counter. Adrien felt on edge. The sense of home he previously felt had long faded, replaced by confusion and discomfort. “I will not stand for this. Not only are you two being immature, you’re causing a disruption in my place of business. Either stop fighting or take it somewhere else.”

“But Maman!” Marinette exclaimed.

Sabine only said one other word, but the finality of it was enough to make anyone run and hide. “Now.”

Marinette’s shoulders drooped as she stalked towards the door. When no one else moved, she inclined her head to indicate they should follow. Alya went first, and the two boys weren’t far behind. Beside Nino, Adrien whispered to himself, “I’m so confused.”

Nino only sent him a sympathetic look.

The four young adults walked upstairs and into a home. Standing inside the living room, Adrien had a sudden recollection of the time he sat with Ladybug, chatting about their childhood homes. This place was just as he imagined.

Nino and Adrien sat on the couch while Marinette and Alya finished their conversation in the kitchen. Both of them had visibly calmed down, and there was no more shouting. Everything else, though, was quiet enough for the boys to hear snippets of the conversation.

After heartfelt apologies, there was a long moment of silence ensued by sporadic sniffles. Alya murmured soothing words that Adrien couldn’t quite discern.

Marinette sighed. “I just don’t understand why you chose now to bring him here, without warning or without the slightest hint.”

“Yes, I did bring him here, but I did this because I love you, and I don’t want to see two of my friends moping because they have both of their heads in the clouds. If I told you ahead of time, you would’ve made some excuse not to be here. And he deserves better than that, Mari. You deserve better than that. Let yourself be happy for once,” Alya said.

While Marinette contemplated her words, Adrien turned to Nino and asked, “Can you please tell me what the hell is going on?”

Nino coughed. “Uh, well, you see…” He began, and the blond knew that he didn’t like where this was going. Nino stumbled and stalled when he was trying to get away from a particular conversation. “Alya and I may have figured out that you and Mari were completely in love with each other… like, in November?”

“What?!” Adrien hadn’t been expecting that. “You mean, you…”

“We knew that you were the Chat Noir she wouldn’t shut up about and she was the Ladybug you were so in love with. Their stories matched, and Alya told me when she saw you wearing the scarf Marinette made you,” Nino confirmed.

“So this entire time, you could’ve given me her number or introduced me to her and you didn’t?”

Nino shook his head. “No, no, don’t play that with me. As Alya told Mari, you two are adults. Your relationship was strictly between the two of you. Both of you were happy to have that mystery, and we weren’t going to intervene and play matchmaker.”

Adrien frowned. “So why intervene now?”

“Because Marinette hardly speaks to anyone and you’ve been shutting everyone out, too. And don’t try to deny it. You’re both heartbroken and in pain, and that sure as hell wasn’t going to end anytime soon because she’s too damn headstrong to even see she’s wrong and you’re too yielding to pursue what you want,” Nino said.

Okay, harsh.

Nino shrugged. “I’m not sugar-coating it for you, bro. It is what it is. I don’t love you any less. Everyone has flaws. Ask Alya about mine, and I’m sure she’d have an entire essay written in a day, works cited page and all. But the thing about flaws is that we don’t see them ourselves unless someone points them out. Only then can we work on overcoming them.”

Adrien stayed silent, wondering when his friend had become so wise.

Alya and Marinette returned to the living room a minute later. Alya gestured for Nino to stand and join her. “We’re going back to the shop to eat and give you guys some time to talk,” she said. As they turned to step to the door leading to the bakery, Marinette began walking the other way, towards a set of stairs leading up to a trap-door. Her bedroom, he realized.

“Maman and Papa love meddling. Papa will use a million excuses to tread in and out. He has to make bread, he forgot a tray of madeleines, he needs to get more change for the register,” Marinette went on. As if realizing she was rambling, she fell quiet and said in a small voice, “We’ll have more privacy up here.”

So up the stairs they went.

Her room was just as pink and cute as she had once described those months ago. It amazed him to see how personal and how lived-in it was. It wasn’t sterile and pristine, as the mansion had been. It was cluttered in its own organized way. A half-finished garment was pinned to a mannequin, and sewing supplies were scattered on the desk. Little trinkets decorated shelves and tables. The fabric of the chaise was worn from years’ use.

“Sorry it’s messy,” Marinette apologized. “Gabriel Agreste is holding another design contest and I’ve been working on my entry. It’s so rare he holds them only a month apart, and I wanted to improve my performance from the last…”

“It’s just as you described it,” Adrien said as he took a seat on the chaise. She settled into the desk chair hesitantly. He turned his gaze to her, a half-smile on his lips. “I’m glad you’re trying again. Perhaps my father won’t be so blind to talent this time.”

Her eyes grew wide at his words, and his expression faltered. Had he said something wrong?

When he voiced his concern, she hastily reassured him all was fine. “I… I guess I’m still in shock about it all. Gabriel Agreste being your father, you being Adrien Agreste. It just seems ridiculous.”

“Ridiculous that I’m a rich boy?”

Marinette shook her head, a small, sad smile curving her lips. “No, no. I knew that you were somewhat well-off. We had talked about it, and there was the fact that you’re in the same league as Chloe Bourgeois. Chloe’s a selective girl when it comes to the company she keeps.”

“I can’t disagree there,” Adrien conceded.

There was a pause before Ladybug—Marinette continued, “It’s just ridiculous to me that you’re talking to me. You’re Adrien Agreste, son of a world-famous fashion designer, model of the most popular brands, company of women like Chloe, women who take one look at people like me and laugh because they are infinitely better. You’re Adrien Agreste, but you’ve been spending your time with me. I’m just... ordinary Marinette, daughter of a baker and a designer with dreams bigger than reality. It’s ridiculous.”

Adrien was taken aback, and it took him a while to formulate a response. He tilted his head, peering at her through green eyes. His eyebrows were furrowed together, not in anger but in sadness. “Do you really think so lowly of yourself?”

She shrugged and looked down at her hands. He reached for her chair and pulled her closer to him. With one hand placed gently upon her knee, he lifted her chin with the other and forced her to look at him. “You are anything but ordinary, Marinette. The girl I’ve fallen in love with, the girl who captured my heart the moment I saw her, is anything but ordinary. So what if your parents aren’t in the highest social bracket? So what if you didn’t grow up in a mansion? I can tell you from experience that it isn’t as fun as it seems. Women like Chloe laugh because they don’t understand, because they’re jealous. You may not be rich and famous, but you have more talent and motivation than they ever will. You have friends and family who love you. You are effortlessly beautiful. You don’t need top-end cosmetics or pricey designer clothes to capture someone’s attention. You have looks, you have personality.

“The first time I saw you, I couldn’t get your face out of my mind. In fact, I was so distracted that I turned all of my white laundry pink. The following week, when we actually met, I thought I could get drunk on the sound of your laugher. I thought I could get high from making you blush. Nino called me a hopeless romantic. Not because I’m Adrien Agreste, in love with an ordinary girl, but because I see all the potential you have. It’s not ridiculous that I spend time with you, that I’m here now, talking to you. It’s ridiculous that you don’t see how special you are, to me, to your loved ones, to the world.”

Marinette laughed. It was small, disbelieving. “And that is exactly what makes this so strange to me—the fact that you can sit here and say all these lovely things to me when I’ve done nothing but hurt you! I avoided you for over a month. I ignored you. I left you hanging, disappearing without a word. And then you march in here, find out who I really am, and still insist that I’m something amazing.”

“Because you are. You _are_ amazing, Marinette!” Adrien exclaimed. As he said this, something clattered downstairs. The two of them went quiet and listened to hushed voices and footsteps scurrying away.

She cursed under her breath and pulled away from him. “I told you they love to meddle,” she muttered. After a moment passed without a noise, she sighed. “I think they’re gone now.”

Adrien dove back into what he was saying before their interruption. “I’ll admit; the past month has sucked. It sucked to go from kissing on my couch and feeling on top of the world to just wishing I could see you one last time. I was hurt. But you’re human, Marinette. You aren’t perfect. You’re going to do things I disagree with and you’re going to be less than flawless. But the bad doesn’t outweigh the good, and trust me, you’ve given me a lot of happiness, too. You’ve given me comfort, support, and words of wisdom. You’ve taken away some of the loneliness I’ve felt for so long. So yeah, I still insist you’re something amazing.”

Marinette pursed her lips and thought for a moment. Then, she inhaled for a length of time, eyes wide, before burying her face in her hands. Her body trembled and shook, and he immediately jumped to console her, only to realize she wasn’t crying. No, she was laughing. She was laughing hysterically.

“Um…” He was at a loss of what to do. He was back to his state of confusion and reluctance.

But his Lady didn’t stop. Her laugh continued, and though it probably should’ve unnerved him, Adrien soon found himself sucked into the laughing fit. His abs would burn for hours afterwards, probably, and he still didn’t know why they were laughing, but it became a simple fact. He had discovered who Ladybug was. He admitted to being in love with her. He most definitely should’ve been concerned by the fact she burst into a giggle fit once he made this confession, but he could think about that when the room wasn’t shaking and tears didn’t threaten to spill.

The laughing finally came to an end, save for a few occasional outbursts. His abs did burn, and the room was spinning. His head was spinning. He hadn’t felt this in… ever. He had never had a laughing fit, and he had especially never had a laughing fit over seemingly nothing.

“I’m sorry… I’m sorry…” Marinette said, fighting for her self-control. When it was evident that she had won that battle, she took a deep breath and met his gaze. “If you went back in time somehow and told thirteen-year-old Marinette that Adrien Agreste would one day sit in her bedroom and prattle on about how amazing she is, she would faint.”

“If you told thirteen-year-old Adrien that he would one day escape his father and fall for a beautiful girl with ladybug-printed underwear, he would dismiss you as insane,” Adrien returned.

Marinette winced, pink flooding her cheeks and the tips of her ears. She shoved him lightly. “You just had to bring that up, didn’t you?”

Adrien grinned from ear-to-ear at the flirtatious teasing and the familiarity in this, in them. “I found it completely endearing! Just as I find the fact that you once had my face covering your walls endearing,” he said. This earned a groan and warranted an elbow to the ribs.

He chuckled, and a comfortable silence settled. Her blush began to fade and she became somber. “I’m sorry for avoiding you,” she said. “I… I got scared. I saw your photo in a magazine. Chat’s face with Adrien Agreste’s name. I freaked out. Just a week prior, we had kissed and you made me feel so special on such a grey day. You were Adrien Agreste. I thought that if you learned my name, you would realize I am nothing. I was afraid you’d hear stories from Chloe. I was humiliated that I had cried to you about losing a contest hosted by your own father. I was scared that I wasn’t enough for you. I forced myself to let you go before that moment came.”

“That moment was never going to happen,” Adrien told her, his words slow and deliberate. “Nothing Chloe could say could change my mind about you. Nothing you do could I ever see as humiliating. You are not nothing, and you are more than enough. You are special. And I’ve been hoping that I’d be able to kiss you again.”

“Even after all this?” She asked. She bit her lip, and he could feel himself grow restless. He wanted to put an end to their talking. He wanted to move closer and wrap his arms around her. He wanted to kiss her senseless, right here in the room he had been told about. But he practiced his self-restraint and tested his patience.

“All this? Water under the bridge,” he said, waving his hand as if to dismiss the problem and watch it dissolve into thin air.

“Even after seeing my fight with my best friend because I didn’t want to admit I was wrong?” She inquired, leaning in ever-so-slightly.

He considered but shook his head. “I heard your apologies. I think it was a learning experience.”

She seemed to think for a moment before deciding her words. “Even after meeting my parents? You aren’t scared?”

“Okay, your mother is a bit intimidating,” he concluded, watching her move toward him again. Her face was close.  “But something tells me that your parents and I have a connection.”

The corner of her lips curled into a smirk. “Maybe you should just kiss them, then.”

“My Lady, please,” he whimpered. He actually whimpered. He was going insane, he believed. Her lips were so near to his. He just wanted to kiss her.

She giggled, and he felt the warmth of her breath on his upper lip. It would take practically zero effort to close the gap between them and—

“AH!” Marinette screamed, pushing far from him. No, not him. Pushing far from the creature that had jumped between them. Adrien felt his heart pounding in his chest, startled by whatever had separated them and by her terror. It took the two of them only a second longer to realize what had interrupted their moment, and they looked at each other before laughing. She scooped a grey kitten into her arms and pressed her lips to its ears. “Oh, Tikki. That wasn’t nice.”

“Is everything okay up there?” A voice below the door asked. Adrien guessed it was her father.

“Everything’s fine, Papa!” Marinette assured him. “Just Tikki being a sneaky little minx and scaring us.”

Her father shifted, Adrien could hear it in the creak of the stairs. “Just making sure I didn’t need to step in. If that boy tries anything, I will-”

“Okay, Papa! You can go back to baking. Adrien is being a perfect gentleman and all is fine, okay love you bye!” Marinette said, the pink returning to her face. Despite the twinge of fear in his heart, Adrien smiled when his footsteps faded away and she refused to meet his gaze.

“That was cute,” he noted. “And you kept the cat I gave you. She’s grown.”

“Well, yeah,” she said, tilting her head at the surprise in his voice. “I wasn’t just going to pass Tikki along to whomever I could. She’s actually been a strong supporter in the past few weeks,” she told him. “Now, where were we?”

“Hm, I don’t recall. Refresh my memory?” He said, still smiling.

Marinette leaned in again, not quite as close as before. He could see a certain playfulness flash in her eyes. “I think we were about right here.”

“That’s funny. I could’ve sworn it was a little more like this…” Adrien said, surging forward. He stopped once their noses were touching.

“Here’s your chance to kiss me again, Chat,” she murmured, her lips all but grazing his. He finally closed the gap between them and pressed his mouth to hers. And in that moment, the world was set right. The drama, the hurt, the mistakes were all washed away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> after two months, she finally writes!!  
> and it's the end!
> 
> i planned for it to be a short fic, but because i had also planned to finish it two months ago, I tossed out my actual planning guide  
> so whether or not this is the ending i had in mind, it's the ending i've written
> 
> i thought it was for the best to end it  
> yesterday, I was finally struck with inspiration and motivation, and managed to write the final 4k  
> so here we are.  
> (and though i make no promises here, i'm thinking that maybe i'll write some bonus scenes in the future?)
> 
> i deleted my little note from last time, explaining my state and all that.  
> i know i didn't reply to any messages, but please don't think that's because i didn't care  
> i was blown away by the concern and the care shown to me by complete strangers.  
> it was overwhelming, the amount of comments and messages i've gotten!  
> like... you guys really care about me, someone that's just a person behind a screen.  
> that's just wow.
> 
> things are okay right now.  
> i've been a bit on edge and struggling, but as of this moment, i'm okay. not bad, not the best, but i'm certainly feeling much better than i was  
> doctor's appointment is in a week.  
> and i've deleted my fandom tumblr, but feel free to follow me on my animals/super gay/aesthetic tumblr @ohtonguetied  
> (and maybe if you pay close attention there you'll see the occasional selfie and quite possibly my gushing about a certain girl who's the epitome of sunshine both in looks and in personality. even if it's an unrequited crush, she's wonderful)
> 
>  
> 
> but yeah, it's the end!  
> our two faves are together! or are they?  
> was it just a kiss, or will this last?
> 
> (spoiler alert: it was most definitely more than just a kiss)
> 
>  
> 
> hope you all are well.  
> thank you for your kind words and encouragement these last few months.  
> you've made such an impact on my life and i am forever grateful  
> <3
> 
> -Cat


End file.
